


In My Head

by Go_get_Jakes_gun



Series: In My Head [1]
Category: Norse Religion & Lore, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Human, Anal Sex, But it's disgusting, Closeted Character, Death, Depressing, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Fighting, Forced Pregnancy, Fratricide, Gang Wars, Gangs, Gratuitous homophobic slurs, Homophobia, Infidelity, Internalized Homophobia, Laufey is His Own Warning, Lots of homophobic slurs, M/M, Masturbation, Multi, Murder, Nobody ever notices Baldr..., Non-Consensual Sex Tape, Oral Sex, Outing, Poor Baldr, Poor Loki, Rape/Non-con Elements, Sad, Suicide, The rape doesn't involve the main characters, The rape isn't explicit, Thor being abnoxious, Thor doesn't realise the game he's playing, Trans Character, Try to be sympathetic, Vaginal Sex, please, revenge porn, so much infidelity..., song-fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-13 08:14:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 43
Words: 59,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29398908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Go_get_Jakes_gun/pseuds/Go_get_Jakes_gun
Summary: For those of you who don't know me:Nine, an island-country in the southern hemisphere, is run by eight gangs, with one neutral spot, Midgard. Although it's eight gangs on paper, though, it's two gangs unofficially: Asgard and Jotunheim.It's at Heven, a club in Midgard, that Thor (Asgard's heir) meets the future shadow-ruler of Jotunheim, Loki. Thor's immediately captivated and can't leave the poor guy alone (Thunder gods tend to be like that); and Loki's battling feelings he's been trained to push down for years thanks to his gang's well-documented history of homophobia.Will they make it work, or will the world they live in tear them apart?For those of you who DO know me:Thor's a horny bastard, and Loki's the poor, closeted fool Thor's turned his attentions to. Allegedly.[Yes, the title of this fic and all of its chapters come from Jason Derulo's 'In My Head', as the fic was inspired by it. Happy V day guys! 😘]
Relationships: Amora/Thor (Marvel), Angrboða | Angerboda/Loki (Norse Religion & Lore) crush, Farbauti/Laufey (Marvel), Frigga | Freyja/Odin (Marvel), Loki/Sigyn (Marvel), Loki/Thor (Marvel)
Series: In My Head [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2159685
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	1. Thor Odinson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, you guys voted this one (and I'm kind of glad you did, because there was a secret bit to this one that I really wanted, and- anyways not gonna spoil it. The other one was cute and fluffy, but this one was darker than anything I've ever written. EVER. I cannot stress that enough :) ). 
> 
> Enjoy! 🥳And happy V day!

A dazzling day in Nine indeed. Thor Odinson walked out of Mindy’s ice-cream parlour, hands full of ice-cream cones for him and his friends. A Chocolate Mint for Sif, a Caramel Swirl for Fandral, a Madagascan Vanilla for Hogun, and a Triple Fudge for Volstagg. Thor himself had a Vanilla Fudge ice cream, and he could not **_wait_** to get into it.

Thor was big, strong, **_tough_**. He had long blond hair that his best-friend Sif had been **_begging_** him to cut off (fat chance, Sif). He liked riding his motorbike, surfing, and being God’s Gift to both women and men alike. That last bit wasn’t hard, given that he’d been ranked by every magazine going back two years as ‘Nine’s Sexiest Man Alive’ (he was currently 20, it would have been a bit weird if they had started when he was underage).

Nine was a… country? Island? City? All, technically. It was autonomous, and it was an island, but it was one BIG island, about 500 kilometres squared, a population of 3.5 _million_ people. Not the biggest country-city in the world in regards to population density, but far from the smallest either.

Nine was a democracy… sort of. It was mostly run by eight gangs (220,000 people), with neutral turf in the middle (Midgard). The important thing was that the common folk **_thought_** it was a democracy.

Thor, was the heir to the Asgardian gang, by far the biggest and best gang in all of Nine. The second biggest were the Jotnar, their heir was Helblindi; then the Vanir (Thor’s cousin Njord, (named after their grandfather); then a bunch of other gangs that were so tiny Thor didn’t even really consider them gangs.

The Aesir and Vanir were friends… the same could not be said about the Aesir and Jotnar. No, they had a bitter rivalry dating back to the founding of Nine two-hundred-and-thirty-seven years prior. Back when Ymir the First and Bor the First first duked it out. Ymir died (obviously, #AesirSuperiority) and the war had thrived ever since. 

The Aesir controlled most of the docklands, which earned them the bulk of their money. The Jotnar tended to deal in more illicit things, like the drug trade and prostitution. You know, because they were inferior and also criminals.

Thor turned his head as Fandral recounted a story of a chick who went down on him in a movie theatre. Classic Fandral. Thor licked at his ice-cream up before it melted onto his hands.

“We’re hitting the club tonight after this, right, old chum?” Fandral asked Thor.

“ _Amora’s_ going to be there, hard pass, right Thor?” Sif nudged her friend. Unfortunately for her, Thor did not think with his brain a lot of the time. Poor Sif.

“Sounds alright. When?”

“Nine. Meet outside?” Fandral and Thor both completely ignored one of the only three rational people in their group.

“Cool, see you there.” Thor confirmed. The five friends walked down the street, re-entering Aesir territory. “You think she’ll be bringing Lorelei?”

“Didn’t they have a fight a few weeks ago?” Sif frowned.

“Damn straight.” Hogun, who was usually silent, smirked. The girls’ fight had been over him. He was the dark, silent, brooding type most girls stereotypically fawned over, with his ponytail and leather jacket and ripped, black denim jeans. People tended to leave him out of the sisters’ fight, that didn’t mean he didn’t enjoy the reminder.

“Attention whore.” Fandral rolled his eyes, knowing exactly what had gone down. 

Hogun flicked Fandral’s head.

A red Chevrolet with its top down sped by. Thor grimaced, whoever was driving it probably had a tiny penis. In it were four men in leather biker jackets. Thor didn’t recognise the car, but he recognised that whole ‘look at us, we can afford leather’ mentality. Those men were Jotnar. Thor spat where the car had been. “Fucking savages, break all the laws why don’t you?”

“Didn’t Mayor Fury say Midgard was going to be crackingdown on crime? How are they allowed to speed here, then?” Volstagg asked. 

“If they get caught, they’ll probably bribe the police, criminals that they are.”

“The police or the Jotnar.” Fandral joked.

“Both.” Sif rolled her eyes. Police were easy to corrupt when you had a net-worth of >1 gold piece. It was sad, really. They **_used_** to have a good police system, but with gangs came money, and with money came systemic corruption. Oh well, as long as the gangs governed themselves, it wasn’t that big of a problem. Nine had a murder rate of 29/100000, but if you weren’t in a gang it fell to something like 6/100000. Similar statistical differences could be found for robberies and vandalism.

“The Jotnar’ve been quiet of late… we should snoop on their territory, see if they’re planning something.” Thor hummed, hand on Jarnbjorn, his pistol.

Sif put a firm hand on her friend’s wrist. “Thor, that would be foolish. We’ve had ten whole years of peace. You would jeopardise that over a bout of pettiness?”

He snatched his hand away. “Friend-Sif, I would do no such thing. We would not be loud, we would be- fine, okay, fine. You don’t need to break out your signature disapproving glare on everything.” He complained. Oh yes she did.

“School starts again in eight days, even if we were to cause a nation-wide war, it’d be over by then. All the gang leaders send their offspring to Marvel, it would be stupid to continue a war when their heirs are all in the same area.”

Thor snorted. “I wouldn’t put it past Jotunheimr. And their heir graduated a while back, remember?” Helblindi was eight years Thor’s senior.

“Don't they have that other kid? Loki, I think his name is. Laufey’s son too.”

“Isn’t Byleistr the spare? If Laufey’s other-other son died I’m sure he’d be upset, but it wouldn’t damage his gang as much as it would damage everyone else’s.”

Sif shrugged. “A lot of people say that Loki’s got the brains of the family. Helblindi will lead, but Loki’ll be the one **_actually_** ruling.”

Thor snorted. “Brains and Jotnar are not exactly synonymous. Even if he had the best brain in his entire gang, rather than just his family, it would not be saying much.”

“Good point.” Fandral laughed, swinging an arm around Thor’s neck as they made their way down the incline. Midgard was slightly elevated relative to Asgard. Midgard was slightly elevated relative to the other eight neighbourhoods. Midgard was, by far, the largest area in all of Nine. About 50 kilometres squared. By contrast, most suburbs were about 10 kilometres squared, and then there was the countryside and the forests and stuff. For that reason, Midgard was where all the shopping centres and schools were, including Marvel University, and a few others, but Marvel was the highest ranking one in the country. Top 10 in the world, best school for three-thousand kilometres in any direction from it.

Midgard was home to the biggest club in Nine, Heven, run by the Angels, a budding sort-of-gang. Thor’s eldest sister, Angela, was the bartender there. It was big enough to fit over a thousand people easily, and had _bomb_ music.

After dropping his friends off at their houses, the future leader of Asgard hopped into his parents’ mansion.

“Brother?” Baldr called, descending the stairs, chocolate stains on his white t-shirt. Oh Norns bless Baldr, he was too perfect for this world.

“Baby brother.” Thor ruffled his hair.

“Have you seen the remote?”

“TV?”

“AC. It’s hot in here.” Baldr frowned.

“Can’t you do it manually?”

Silence. Baldr really was too perfect for this world. Thor went up the stairs and pressed the ‘start’ button for the room that Baldr had _clearly_ been inhabiting seconds prior, if the blankets and crisp packets were anything to go by. His brother had been a bit down lately, ever since he broke up with Nanna. Maybe Thor ought to invite him to go clubbing later on.

Some people, Baldr included, thought Thor came off as arrogant. The joke was on them though, Thor was just **_confident_**. Who **_wouldn’t_** be confident when they looked like a Norse God? With big muscles, and sparkling blue eyes, and a nice big dick as a cherry on top. 

Thor got away with having a huge ego, though, because he had a huge heart. He was the embodiment of the term ‘golden boy’. Case in point? “Come along, brother.” Thor guided Baldr back to his couch. “There we go, that’s it. Would you like for me to put a show on for you?”

“No, Thor- I don’t **_want_** another show. I want-” Baldr clenched his fists, an angry, frustrated expression crossing his face, before he started crying again.

Thor was a brave man. He had once fought off half a dozen Dark Elves who were trying to rob a bank, with nothing but his bare hands. He had once fought off a shark when it had tried to eat Fandral. He’d once commandeered a search-and-rescue mission when Baldr had got lost snowboarding, **_during a blizzard_**.

But tears were Thor’s kryptonite, and he awkwardly left his brother to himself, taking refugee in his bedroom. Whoo, that was intense. He went over to his walk-in closet and closed the door behind him so he’d have a mirror. Thor hummed. Should he go to the club in **_casual_**? In a **_suit_** _?_ In a tanktop with a leather jacket, like some greaser? That felt kind of cheesy, like something a Jotunn would do… tank top with a blazer and some jeans though? That was better. He threw on a navy blazer, some blue-denim jeans, and a white tank top. That way when he took off his jacket, Amora could see his ‘initiate tattoo’, she loved it the most. And he loved how her tongue felt against it, he shivered in anticipation.

He put on some sneakers and walked out. “Where are you going?” Baldr asked, popping his head out from under the blankets. Oh right, shit.

“Out. You wanna come?” Baldr hesitated, then shook his head, those beautiful blue eyes of his unfocused and lost. If Thor didn’t know any better, he’d think little Baldr was on drugs. Thankfully, there was no way that that would ever happen. “Bye!”

“Bye.” Baldr called after him, as Thor walked down the stairs, exited the door, and shut it behind him.

He was gonna get **_laid tonight_**!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> O.M.F.G. HAVE I GOT SOME STUFF TO SAY: (DW, you can skip this, it's just me ranting and has no bearing on the story)
> 
> So I wrote the first 6 chapters of this before the year started, and then it got super slow and I stalled on, I think, chapter 7 lmao. Then a day or two before February hit, I was like 'wait- wtf!? I have like 37 chapters left!!!' and I had to rush this. Be prepared for split-personality characters and a story that was kind of rushed. It was still fun, would have been nice to go on a bit longer though (word-count, not chapters, lmao. Chapters are enough). 
> 
> I'd thought about maybe only posting half today, and then half at a later date (i.e. in two instalments), but I really, REALLY wanted to fulfil my pledge, and here it is:
> 
> ^^^ Legit only popped that in there for you guys to understand why there's a bit of inconsistency, and why there might be spelling or grammar errors (6 chapters. I wrote SIX CHAPTERS in a day. It took me about 8 hours. Understandably, there'll be some errors in there, but I'll review the story a few times and correct them)


	2. (Loki Laufeyson) C’mon, yeah

TO CLARIFY, it wasn’t Loki’s idea to go to that stupid club in the first place.

He’d been smoking a cigarette and playing pool with a few other Jotnar his age. He was no fool, he wasn’t he most popular person in the world, he’d been born into the toughest gang in Nine, and he’d been born without the same gene that gave his brothers, and most others in the gang, their massive muscles. No, Loki’d always been on the weaker side, it was why he was so cunning.

Jarnsaxa was there, and Angrboda, Sigyn, Svadilfari, Drrf, Logi, and Skadi. Half the people in the group hated him, always a good start.

Drrf was a short, young boy. He was a few years younger than Loki, 16, still a minor. He had brown hair and dark skin and brown eyes. He was ‘weak’ like Loki, born with low muscle-tone, but in all honesty Loki preferred him to literally everyone else in the room. What could he say? Drrf was his baby.

Sigyn was Loki’s long-time girlfriend, they’d been dating for three years. She had dirty-blond hair, glowing blue eyes. Her chin was soft as a petal, and rainbows formed in the sky every time she laughed. She was breathtaking, truly.

Jarnsaxa was a tool.

Angrboda was a handsome man. 6”3, dark blue eyes, nice abs, firm chest, lean but he had biceps, his arms were about 14 inches around. Every girl in Nine **_wanted_** that man. Well, Loki often joked about his dear friend, at least until they met him. He had a thick head of shaggy, neck-length hair that girls loved to play with. He could also sing quite nicely, Loki liked that. And he played the guitar, and had calloused hands, and had a bit of stubble on his usually clean-shaven face (Loki’d remind him about that later) and he liked vanilla lattes and hated tea (the heathen) and also liked listening to Mumford and Sons and Falling in Reverse. He was studying law alongside Loki. He didn’t have a girlfriend.

Svadilfari was pretty good looking too, 6”5, dark brown hair tied back in a ponytail, brown eyes too, bigger than ‘Boda, liked wearing tank tops to show off his muscles. He was possibly the second most attractive Jotunn male in all of Jotunheimr. He liked cold beer and busty women.

Logi was like Loki, but bigger and with red hair. He **_did_** have the normal non-‘runt’ genes that most Jotnar possessed. He also had freckles and liked driving muscle cars.

Skadi was a 5”8, platinum-blonde braided woman who liked wearing miniskirts and leather jackets, and sometimes shot from the hip which was more than a little terrifying. She was Angrboda’s girlfriend. Loki hated her, and the feeling was mutual. He thought about that time he’d insulted her and she’d retaliated by tying his balls (while he was sleeping) to the beard of a nanny goat, and handcuffing him so he could do nothing as she fed it. And yet still his oldest friend (who had been there at the time and **_laughed_** , mind you) struck up a relationship with her. Asshole.

She was Sigyn’s cousin. That was one thing he and Sigyn shared, annoying cousins.

“We’re out of coke.” Logi cursed, shaking his drug box. 

“Mjoll will be back next week with more drugs. We’ve already sold all of our shares for this month… and how did we manage to finish it?” Angrboda

“It’s that girlfriend of his, Mallory, she’s addicted.” Skadi scoffed.

“Is not!”

“Is too!”

“Is not!”

“Is too!”

“Quit it, you two fight like fire and thrice damned ice!” Jarnsaxa snapped, ever the head bitch of any group. Oh how Loki detested his cousin. He took another drag of his cigarette, bored already. The only two people here with half a wit were Sigyn and Angrboda, the rest of this was nonsensical drivel.

“I bet there’ll be coke at the club.” Sigyn offered, wanting to end the fight. She was always so virtuous, Loki loved her, truly. He did.

“Heven?… you’re right.” Angrboda nodded. There _would_ be coke at the club. “Let’s go.” Aaaand _that_ was Loki’s cue to slink off. He didn’t do parties, period. Angrboda caught his arm. “ _Not so fast_. You’re coming. I promised ‘Blindi I’d start taking you out more.”

“My father hates it when I show my face in public, I should go back.”

“Indeed.” Jarnsaxa nodded ‘grimly’. “Uncle does not like Loki going out much.”

“Then he doesn’t need to know.” Angrboda winked cheekily. And, well, how was he supposed to say ‘no’ to his oldest friend?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should point out that this won't be the only short chapter: some chapters are nice and long, but I wanted to use EVERY (main) word of the song, so I had to stretch the story (which I think would normally have only been about 30 chapters) across 43 chapters.


	3. Everybody’s looking for love, oh. Ain’t that the reason you’re at this club, oh?

A black Land Rover pulled up outside of Heven, and Thor, Fandral, Sif, Hogun and Volstagg (who’d been sitting in the pop-up seats in the back) got out, the chauffeur driving off with the car. They were immediately greeted with much fanfare. Of course they were, everyone knew who they were. Everyone and their mom wanted a taste of Thor. Thor winked at one girl who was desperately filming him with her phone, lollipop in his mouth. She nearly fainted, one of her friends had to catch her. 

Thor stepped into the neon purple club, with the golden lights and the silver, galactic, shimmery dust, and immediately headed over to the bar-area. Blessedly, it was empty-ish.

“Angela.” He kissed his sister on the cheek.

“Thor!” She threw her arms around him.

Angela and Thor had not always known that they were siblings. As a baby, Angela had been stolen from the hospital, by a madwoman called Queenie, who had been Head of the Angels. Odin and Frigga had been told that their firstborn was stillborn. It was only years later when Queenie and her partner, Loriel, were caught for this transgression… apparently Angela had not been the only baby they’d stolen.

Miffed, Angela and the rest of the girls who’d been kidnapped had decided to start their own gang. To take back the name ‘Angels’ and _man_ was Thor proud of his sister for doing so!

Thor liked to joke that in some ways Angela had been lucky, apparently their parents had intended to name her **_Aldrif_**! Aldrif Odinsdottir… she’d never find a husband or a wife with that name. In return, Angela would joke that Thor should stop being an ungrateful cunt and appreciate that he’d not been kidnapped at birth and raised by two madwomen. Sibling banter at its finest.

“How goes business?”

“It’s been going **_great_** since we got a couple of the girls to sneak into Jotunn territory and steal a bunch of coke.”

Thor laughed. “You’re so **_intelligent_**! I wish more Aesir could be like you.”

"You've got Sif… for now.” It was no secret that the Angels had been trying to recruit Sif. It was also no secret that Sif **_hated_** single-sexed gangs. She’d wanted to join to Valkyrior, a single-sexed faction of the Aesir, she’d come back a month later with a whole host of stories to tell (though in hindsight, one could argue that 15 had been a bit young to try and join an organisation like that). Still the Angels persisted.

“Har, har. Anyways, can I please have five drinks?”

“What would you like?”

“Surprise me.”

Angela hummed in contentment, before going back and whirring up some crazy concoctions. One was an electric blue, one was pinky-purple, three were colourless but with fruits in them. “Give the blue one to Fandral.” Angela smirked. He hadn’t seen her throw any drugs in, and knew her better than to do so, so he figured ‘why not?’ And took them away on a platter she loaned to him.

He sat drinking cocktails with his friends and chatting as they waited for more people to arrive… or more specifically, as Thor waited for Amora to arrive.

“I thought you said she was gonna be here.” He turned to Sif an hour later. 

“That’s what **_she_** had up on her story. Maybe she decided not to come last minute.” Sif shrugged. Thor didn’t follow Amora on Instagram because then he’d just look desperate. And Thor Odinson was **_never_** desperate. It was all part of the game, truly. This was why he was the top bachelor in town.

The doors opened, and Thor looked over, a little desperate, hoping for Amora. What he was greeted with instead was a group of people, all wearing black leather jackets, most of them with dark hair themselves. **_Eurgh_**! Who invited the **_Jotnar_**? He pulled a face and Fandral laughed, seeing what he saw.

There were eight of them, Thor noted. So bored out of his wits, that he was even bothering to give those pieces of actual garbage a second glance. #TrailerTrash. There was one good-looking one with black hair, sturdy, seemed like a complete arsehole. You know? The kind of guy who cheats on you with your sister after blowing your inheritance on crack and strippers. Another with dark, chocolatey-brown hair, bigger than the first one. He looked like some smug, hipster, vegan arsehole who liked to surf and play the guitar and walk around the house naked when there were guests at home, all ‘au naturel’ and that shit. Then there was a tiny one- probably came in on a fake ID, Thor could respect that, he’d done it a ton of times himself- who looked like the person you took with you on a home robbery to stick in through the cat flap. There was a redhead with freckles and a weird goatee who looked like every painting of a satyr since the dawn of time. There were three girls there, all blonde, though he couldn’t see the one in the back quite well. And finally, there was an eighth one with dark hair, somewhere further to the side. If Thor had to guess, it was probably another girl, 4 guys and 4 girls made more sense than 5 guys and 3 girls. Unless of course two of them were LGBTQ+, which was okay (at least in Asgard, which was comparatively more progressive than the other backwards gangs that ruled Nine).

Thor got up, Sif looked at him apprehensively. “Thor, you’re not going to go there and start trouble, are you?” She framed it like a question, but her tone was anything **_but_** questioning. Thor brushed her off.

“Relax, dear friend! I would do nothing of the sort. I’m just going to go and fetch us all some more drinks. Fandral, are you coming?” Fandral got up, Sif’s glare grew in intensity. “Sifff, Sif, Sif! Have I **_ever_** let you down before?”

“Give me a year, I’ll give you a list of times.” She stated, not backing down on her glare one bit.

“Well, you have my _word_ that I’ll be at my most civil this time. Come along, Fandral.” As Thor turned his back with his friend and left, he heard Sif mutter ‘That idiot’s going to get us all killed.’

“Relax, Sif. No guns in this club, remember.” Hogun soothed. Pssh, Thor had a **_knife_**! Hogun was _such_ an amateur sometimes!

Thor and Fandral elbowed their way back to the bar right before those Jotunn idiots got there.

“Fandral.” Angela grinned at her brother’s best friend, all teeth. “How was your drink?”

“Delicious as ever.” Something something, Fandral never got drunk ever and once insulted Angela’s drink-mixing skills, something something, Angela never forgave him and vowed to make him pay for such an insult, something something. “5 more of those?”

“Certainly.” She swished her hips as she walked away. It was a good way to earn tips (ew, not from her brother and his friend, she **_had_** noticed the other people walking up right behind them!)

Thor turned around, an arrogant look on his face as he drank in the two Jotnar that had come to collect drinks for **_their_** group. Thor’s bad, what he had assumed to be a woman was _actually_ just a fairly dainty man, with his hair in braids, and that other black-haired person was, in fact, a male. He had mesmerising green eyes, which more than made up for his greasy hair, and sharp features. Despite his emo-look, something about him made Thor want to smile. Hmmm, curious, curious indeed. He must be a groupie, Thor’d never seen him before.

He heard the blond say something to the emo, something in Norse (pssh, like Thor didn’t understand _Norse_ ). ‘Aesir idiots.’

‘Don’t mind them,’ the black-haired one said right back to his… boyfriend? Perhaps. Though with all of Thor’s experience dealing with the same sex (he was pansexual- which he thought was funny given that he was named after a fertility god) he wouldn’t have pegged two **_obvious_** bottoms to be together… Mmmm, they were both good looking, he’d pay to see that.

Angela came back with a platter full of blue drinks, which Thor and Fandral loaded onto the tray and left with. Thor checked the emo’s ass. Nice. Thor wouldn’t mind having a go. The dismissive comment had indicated that the emo didn’t really care much for gang-rivalries, so yeah, Thor was probably right in guessing that he was a groupie. Ha, well, if he was so interested in gang-banging, maybe Thor ought to invite him over to the better end of town. He looked too cute to be getting mixed up with those dumpster divers. (He’d be willing to take blondie in too, for the right admission fee ;) (he could see them both dressed up as servants, he as an emperor, them servicing him… _hot_ )).

“What took you two so long?” Sif asked, suspicious as ever about her two idiot friends.

“ _Angela_.” Thor said, sitting down. “And we were barely gone three minutes.”

“Three minutes is plenty of time. And anyways, I don’t think that Amora’s going to be here, so we can just go ahead and leave.”

The doors opened and in walked Amora and her entourage. Fuck, Sif cursed. That bitch had the _worst timing_! Thor immediately launched into conversation with Hogun, as though they’d been chatting all night. Stupid people, Sif got up and excused herself to the restroom.

Amora walked over and took Sif’s spot. “ ** _Thor_**! I didn’t expect to see you here!” Thor blinked, as though he were surprised to hear her voice, turning around and _slowly_ schooling his expression so that it _just_ looked as though a smile had broken out over his face, rather than that he’d been grinning for a full two minutes.

“Amora! It’s been so long, hey!” He got up and gave her a hug, as though they were ‘old friends’. That’s right, bitch, fume it up, makes the sex even better.

“No kiss?” She asked, coyly, twirling a strand of her long, blonde hair. Out of the corner of his eye, Thor noticed the two Jotnar (or rather the one Jotunn and the one wannabe) head back to the main Jotunn group. They were all gathered around a table, some chick with shades near them. Must be doing crack. What a shame, pretty thing like that, doing the hard drugs. Thor thought to his own past use of cocaine. He’d never overdone it, and besides he was a big guy, he could take a few lines. Emo kid, however, was **_tiny_**! You could’ve fit two of him in one Thor. Thor watched emo kid stare at the others as they did it, taking three shots of vodka, not indulging in the drug. Good on you, emo kid. Thor kissed Amora’s cheek, absently. Amora sighed, upset, and dragged Thor’s face to her, knowing full-well how he liked to play his little games. “You, me, dance floor _now_.” She purred into his ear. 

When a girl told you to do something like that, one did not typically argue. It was all in the name of tail that Thor followed Amora out onto the dance floor.

He spun her around the shiny, silver-surface. She squealed with pure joy, her too-short black dress riding up a little, she smoothed it down when they stood up, in part to draw his attention to it, obviously.

“Kiss me.” She commanded.

“Of course.” He replied, fulfilling her wish.


	4. You ain’t gonna find it dancing with him, no, got a better solution for you girl, oh…

“Dance with me, baby.” Sigyn pouted, finding herself a nice seat in Loki’s lap. He was surprised that he could hear her at all with all the racket in the background. Seriously? _This_ was what qualified as music these days? He’d rather be in his room back home listening to My Chem, thanks!

“How am I going to do that while you’re sitting in my lap?” Loki teased, getting up just as she did so herself, allowing her to lead him off.

“Me too.” Skadi, the bitch, demanded of Angrboda. Copycat. Never original, that one. Loki’s polite best-friend obliged his girlfriend her request, not that he _had_ to do so. She needed to learn how to take ‘no’ for an answer, honestly.

Jarnsaxa, Drrf, and Svadilfari immediately tried finding women to pick up. Logi sat back, enjoying his coke. He already had a girlfriend, dammit.

.

Thor twirled Amora around the floor, their joining of it immediately attracting others to come and dance as well. Seriously, Angela should be paying him for all the hype he generated.

He noticed the Jotnar and emo kid getting on the dance floor too. Urgh, they could **_not_** dance! Seriously, were they all virgins or something? (Actually, Thor wouldn’t mind it too much if emo kid was a virgin. Virgins were always fun, that look on their face when they found out they had a prostate! Ha! Classic!)

He was dancing with that girl with the dirty-blond hair. She had pretty unremarkable features, must be a friend or something. Nah, not a _cousin_ , they didn’t look related. He watched as she kept touching emo kid, and emo kid kept slightly moving back, like he didn’t really want her to touch him there. Oh. She must have a crush on him and have trouble with boundaries, Thor’d seen that sometimes in friendships. Poor emo kid.

He watched arsehole McGee dancing with the platinum blond one, shooting looks over at emo kid from time to time, even as he slid his hands down his woman’s sides. Interesting. Someone had a crush, it seemed. 

Blond twink was doing the Macarena, because of _course_ he was.

Thor turned back to Amora, and lifted her up and over his head, drawing cheers from nearby onlookers. 

Now **_that_** was a dance move. 

He locked eyes with douche-galore, who slid between his girlfriends widened legs. It was on.

.

After about two hours of dancing with Amora, in which he _totally_ showed up those stupid Jotnar, the woman had decided to leave. She had just up and vanished. It was all a part of their game, in truth. She was probably still somewhere here, waiting for Thor to head to the exit so he could catch her with some other man near said exit. So that Thor’d get all riled up and want to fuck her hard the next time. Thor wasn’t saying it didn’t work, but he knew her moves like the back of his hand by now. Seriously, she should get some new ones, predictable never looked good on anyone.

Thor spied emo kid. He’d done so a few times throughout the night, emo kid and his friends had all been dancing… well, two could play at Amora’s game… or maybe he’d get even luckier and sleep with Mr. Daddy Long-legs himself. It would more than make up for missing Amora’s sweet poon. Kid had a nice butt… odd to think of someone his age as a ‘kid’, but Thor dwarfed most people, so he ought to have the right to call _everyone_ a ‘kid’.

“What’s a pretty thing like you doing at a club like this?” Thor purred. 

The man looked up at Thor in an odd way. “What are you doing?”

“Flirting? Someone as gorgeous as yourself must be used to that.”

“I’m straight.” **_Bullshit!_** Thor had the best gaydar in Nine, this guy was **_not_** straight! He was just playing hard to get, Thor was sure.

“Bullshit.” He challenged.

“I’m serious. I have a girlfriend.” He gestured off to the beard he’d been dancing with. Oh **_honey_**. 

“Wow. From the way you two danced I would have thought ‘friends’ was a stretch.” Thor chortled. 

“Well she’s my girlfriend and I love her very much. I intend to propose to her within the month.” Loki said, stiffly. 

“Within the month? Norns, kid, aren’t you like 20 or something?”

“So?”

“Hey, Loki. Is this guy bothering you?” That dark-haired douche from earlier approached.

Before Loki could answer, Thor smirked. “Fucking knew it.”

“I’m not a fag.”

“He called you a fag?” Angrboda looked up at Thor with a face full of incredulity, then swung at the man.

“Hey man, what’s your problem?” Thor asked, while taking his own swing at douche. Douche’s friends had started circling them. No reply was given. None needed to be given, the all knew how this was going to go down. They were used to that #ThugLife. Thor looked around for backup.

And that was when Fandral and co. joined in. 

Sif went for the blonde bitches, Sif could more than take them, he knew. Heck, she could have probably taken on the horse-man dude (he didn’t know the huge brunet’s name, so he was going to go with that). 

Volstagg took on Horse Guy, Fandral took on the redhead, Hogun took on Loki and the two other guys (the blond and the kid). It was a full on brawl now, Thor wasn’t even thinking about how much trouble he’d be in with his sister for this.

Thor kicked at douchebag, but he ducked out of the way and punched Thor in the jug.

“Hey!” A loud voice boomed. Everyone stopped and turned to face Angela. “Take it outside **_now,_** before I ban all of you!” She ordered.

They complied.


	5. Just leave with me now, say the word and we’ll go

Thor fought Douchebag out in the parking lot, grateful that he could now take out his knife. Turned out the bastard’d had one of his own. Everyone else was using their fists.

By this point, Thor and Douchebag had both had a fair go at the other. Thor had marks on his hands and his jacket was ripped up, douchebag had marks on his _neck_ and also on his hands. Thor dodged a lunge from Douchebag’s knife which had almost gone into his abdomen, before backhanding the man across the face, his rings leaving dents in the other man’s skin.

Sirens rang out, announcing that the police had arrived. Everyone ran. There was only so much that their gangs could protect them from- public scrutiny was not one of them. Besides, Angela’d have killed them if they’d made her bar look like it was some rowdy joint.

“What happened?” Sif asked, once they were back in the Land Rover. 

“Well, I was flirting with the emo-looking one, Loki, and then the douche-y looking one came up to me and starting saying that I was calling Loki a ‘fag’.”

Fandral gasped and slapped his best-friend of over twenty years (they’d been born on the same week, and had been in that baby-room-thing together). “Thor! You’re not supposed to say that word!”

“I wasn’t using it, I was _quoting_ it!” Thor bit back, rubbing his swollen cheek. He had blood on his hands from where Douchesaurus-Rex had managed to nick him with his blade. _Ha_! Thor had left a mark from the man’s elbow to his wrist, deep enough to last at least two weeks.

“Loki… that’s it! That’s the name I was trying to remember.” Sif clicked her fingers. “Earlier today, when I mentioned Laufey’s son that goes to school with us. Thor I think that that’s him.”

Hogun whistled. “If that’s the case, I wouldn’t want to be you, my friend. You messed with Jotunn Royalty.”

“Trash’s Royalty is still trash.” Thor deadpanned.

“I think I’m going to need stitches.” Volstagg grunted, holding his bleeding elbow from where finger nails had dug into it.

“Thor too.” Sif examined the knife-mark on his neck. An inch or two deeper and her idiotic friend may have died.

“Sif, you’ve barely a scratch on you.” Fandral remarked in awe. Sif snorted.

“The Jotnar don’t seem too keen on training their daughters in combat… or at least I hope they aren’t, because if _that’s_ them when they’re trained.” Sif shuddered. The dirty-blonde one had tried to punch Sif in the jaw and had missed by a whole two inches. Pathetic. The platinum blonde one, by contrast, had at least put up **_somewhat_** of a fight. If trying to tackle Sif and promptly getting punched off qualified as a fight.

.

“You okay?” Boda asked Loki, who was nursing a broken arm from when that black-haired man had delivered him, Saxa, and Drrf a roundhouse kick. Loki had been the farthest in front, about to slam a trash can lid over the man’s head, and had naturally taken most of the force.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Loki resisted the urge to shiver as Boda took Loki’s arm in his hands. The others had all gone home, it was just the two of them, his mind raced. “What about yourself?”

“I’ve seen better days.” He shrugged, lip badly cut. Loki shook his head.

“Boda, you need to go to the hospital. Come, I’ll drive.” Loki stood up, feeling dizzy immediately. He stood still a moment to gather his bearings. Not the best condition to drive in, but not the worst either, he supposed. Besides, nobody was out at 11pm, they were either _in_ a club, partying, or _in_ their houses, safe. 

They hopped onto Angrboda’s motorbike. Loki didn’t have one, had never seen the point, but he wasn’t so sure he was fit to commandeer a car at the moment, and besides it would be less conspicuous and also just _faster_ to get there by motorbike (assuming there was some traffic… wait, hadn’t he just said that there’d be no traffic? Norns, his head hurt).

Angrboda locked his arms around Loki, and leaned into him, the warmth of him soothing Loki’s bruised back. He’d driven this thing before, they were in good hands. They took off, helmets on their heads.

When they got to the ER, the doctors wound up checking **_Loki_** in (despite his protestations that he was _very much_ fine) because he had what they called a ‘concussion’. Pssh, crazy lizard people! They forced him to lie down and ran a few tests on him, and treated his arm and his leg which was also apparently broken, then called his emergency contact, which was Helblindi because _fuck Laufey_!

His breathing hadn’t quite returned to normal by the time that Helblindi arrived to pick him and Angrboda up. “What happened? I heard there was a fight.”

“An Asgardian called me a fag, so we decided to teach him some manners.” Loki spat. 

Helblindi’s expression turned stony. Homosexuality was very, **_very_** much illegal in Jotunheimr. “Good.” He said, as the three of them drove off, Helblindi promising Angrboda that they could grab his bike in the morning.

.

Odin screamed Thor’s ear off. His mother, he found, was much more understanding, though equal in her disapproval for his shenanigans.

“Why’d it start?” Thor shrugged.

“A couple of Jotnar were being arseholes. Things got out of hand.”

“It could have ended so terribly… you know what happened to Hela.” Oh yes, **_everyone_** knew what had happened to Thor’s older sister. One failed dodge of a knife and she’d lost half her face. They’d had to get plastic surgery done on her to fix it. It was when Odin had sent her away to live in Norway with her mother.

“I know, I know.” But **_I_** wouldn’t let something like that happen to me.

“Good boy.” She pinched his cheek. “And speak to your brother, something is troubling his mind.”

"I will, I will.” He waved it off. Pssh, Baldr was **_fine_**! His mother was worrying about nothing! But sure, he’d check up with his brother… tomorrow. He’d do it tomorrow. Yeah. Probably.

Thor walked past his cocooned little brother, ignoring the chips lying all around the floor, and closed his bedroom door so that he could get a good night’s sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thor's not very good at feelings, is he? 😂


	6. I’ll be your teacher, I’ll show you the ropes

By the time school had started, everyone had recovered from the ordeal more or less. 

Thor and his gang of friends stuck close to one another, in anticipation of another Jotnar attack. Technically MU was neutral territory, but one could never be certain with those untrustworthy Jotnar.

Thor had mostly forgotten about the good-looking boy at the club, the _Laufeyson_. Thor knew what Helblindi and Byleistr looked like, Loki had looked nothing like them. Well, the black hair, pale skin, and green eyes were all there, he supposed, but Loki didn’t appear as, well, **_built_** as either of his brothers… or most Jotnar for that fact. Maybe the genes had skipped him?

That being said, as with all things, once you knew something existed you would never stop noticing it. And oh boy, Loki was just **_everywhere_**! In the hallways, on the lawn, chatting to professors Thor knew because they happened to be Aesir. A mop of black hair forever haunting him, never allowing Thor to escape his sight… well, how was he not supposed to take interest?

And that was when the watching started.

Turns out Loki was a law student, like Sif and Hogun, and they had lectures together. Two and a half years and neither of the pair had realised it. This had prompted them to reassess the class, wherein they had reported that that weird, douchey Jotunn was also in the class, and that they’d sussed out that his name was ‘Angrboda’. ‘Harm-bidder’… seemed apt.

Thor didn’t know what it was about Loki that fascinated him so, in truth. He was hot as fuck, sure, but most people were in this country. Heck, Thor had gone out with girls twice as hot as Loki was, and he didn’t mean that as an offence to Loki, but he _was_ Nine’s most eligible bachelor, after all. Was it that he was closeted? Hmm… Thor supposed that he _had_ never been with someone closeted before, but when he thought about it internally, the idea didn’t appeal to him. Thor was the kind of person that did _not_ like to be hidden- he was too perfect for that! Look at his shiny teeth! Look at his lovely, blond ponytail dammit!

Perhaps his interest wasn’t even romantic. Perhaps he was just interested in the idea of being so near the man who was to be the brains behind Asgard’s biggest rival… nah, he still wanted to bang him, but that one too. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer and all that.

Whatever the case, one could not deny that Loki Laufeyson was an interesting subject. Nor that it was, truly, a matter of Asgardian interest that Thor find out all that he could about the male. It could come in useful, eventually. As future leader of the Aesir, **_this_** was Thor’s true duty, even above passing university!

It was how Thor had discovered that the man was in the journalism club, the debate club, the orchestra (he played the flute: snake charmer, nice), and some pro-bono club all the law students took part in to get field hours (it counted towards their qualification).

Thor’s own activities were: Being God’s Gift to Mankind; Surfing Club, Frisbee Club, Rugby Club, and Doctors Without Borders, which fell in line with the medical degree he wanted to pursue. After years of seeing his loved ones get shot down, Thor had decided that he wanted to be a doctor. It helped that the hottest girl in high school (and now in college), Jane Foster, wanted to be a nurse. Though she’d since switched over to Astrophysics, declaring that there simply wasn’t enough maths in nursing. Whatever, she was still hot.

Thor stood by the trees, hidden by their shade, watching as Loki kicked a ball to his striker. The striker kicked it into the net. Oh yeah, Loki was also on the football team. Apparently he _did_ adhere to the family traditions. Thor remembered Byleistr, Loki’s elder brother, had also played football. Loki was Right Midfielder. Interesting, he must be using these skills to… yeah, who was Thor kidding? He watched on, forgetting the pain of his wrists from his scuffle with Angrboda for a moment. Loki was quite good, and fun to watch. 

The douchebag was a member of the soccer team too, centre-back. Thor was pretty sure he was only on the team so he could stare at Loki while he changed in the changing room, or something like that. The guy seemed like a fucking creep.

Loki turned around and froze, his eyes narrowed. There was someone by the trees. Coach? He looked around and spied coach by the stands, talking to Engelbert, their reserve goalie. Not coach then, Loki turned back to the trees, starting to walk forwards towards them. Who was that watching them? Angrboda saw Loki, glanced over to where Loki was walking, and started walking towards the trees too.

Whoever was in the trees quickly turned around and left. Loki sped up his step, but by the time he reached the trees, whoever it was was well gone. 

“Well, that was weird.” Angrboda commented.

“Definitely.” Loki agreed. 

.

Thor waxed his surfboard. The bus was about to take them out to Sandy Beach. He eyed Loki as he talked to Angrboda, Sigyn (Loki’s beard) and Skadi (douche’s girlfriend- Thor was confident that douchey-mc-douche was either bi or pan. But he certainly wasn’t straight, and that was what mattered. [who could call themselves straight when literally the hottest twink to ever twink was their friend?]) were chatting amongst themselves. Poor lonely women. Time with Fandral would do them both some good. Or time with one another. They were both pretty hot.

Technically Thor didn’t **_have_** to be polishing his board here, on the field, but he’d managed to convince Fandral that they should polish their boards while enjoying the sunshine and the fresh air, and his dope of a best friend agreed. He didn’t even question it! You HAD to love Fandral. 

He noticed Loki notice his stare lingering, and went back to focusing on his board. He looked at his watch. “Fandral, we need to go, the bus is coming in 5 minutes.”

Fandral nodded. He did **_not_** want to miss the bus again. Surfing was life, how was he supposed to go another week without it? Thor, the arsehole, had posted videos of himself that last time, surfing, onto his story. For everyone to see. While Fandral was staring at his ceiling trying to figure out if life meant anything once one had to forego a surfing trip. How could one be so cruel?

Thor spared a glance Loki’s way as they left. Thankfully, the smaller (by like an inch) male didn’t seem to notice him. Though that platinum-blonde chick did, sending a glare at their direction. It was highly likely that she thought that he wanted another fight, given what had happened the last time that all of the were in a close proximity. He doubted she’d bother mentioning it though. She didn’t seem like the type to bring up anything important.

Maybe that’s what drew him to Loki so much: that whole ‘I don’t belong where I am’ aura that he resonated. Loki didn’t seem like the kind of kid that’d do too well in a gang, and Thor had to ask himself if Loki knew that too. If Loki only stayed because he was their leader’s son. Thor was a known liberator, a saviour of men and women alike. His newfound interest in Loki must be his hero instincts kicking in, trying to figure out how to save the damsel in distress that Loki so clearly was. He knew he had to do it, it was his obligation. And if the normo-world was too dangerous for Loki after his gang exploits, then maybe Thor could bring him to Asgard and make him an Asgardian. He must know things that would be vital to Asgard’s Intelligence Committee. Plus, it’d piss off Laufey, and that was always a good reason to do something.

.

Thor watched Loki playing football right as the rugby team (Thor was Captain) began to congregate.

He must have stared too long, because Loki locked eyes with him. Loki had an expression on his face, both wild and unexpressive. That expression must have taken hours to practice in the mirror, but even that lighthearted joke-thought could not take away from the sinking feeling in Thor’s stomach, that Loki knew that Thor had been watching him, and that Loki, with that beautiful, beautiful mind of his, had something planned. Thor gulped. He’d watched Loki debate (disguised in a cap and sunglasses), he knew the man was smart, he knew the man had older brothers who wouldn’t mind fucking Thor up… he knew he had to watch his back from here on out. 


	7. You’ll see a side of love you’ve never known

Loki was no idiot, he knew that _someone_ had been watching him the past two weeks. It had started with that person in the trees at practice, then the feeling that somebody was following him home from uni the one time that he walked back, then the weird guy in his debate room with the sunglasses on (what kind of douchebag wore sunglasses indoors?), and the never-ending feeling of _somebody,_ ** _somewhere_** out watching him.

And then he had seen Thor Odinson watching him during football practice (he knew Thor was on the rugby team, Svad (also on the team) had told him) and had pieced it together. He’d sure seen a lot of the blond hot-head lately. The buffoon wasn’t as discrete as he thought he was. A frown hit Loki’s mouth. He had to confront him, he knew. Had to get the arsehole to back off. He didn’t want another fight, he still lapsed into random headaches from time to time thanks to that last fight. _See, Helblindi, this was how you did diplomacy_.

He thought about getting ‘Boda to go with him, but decided against it. It might seem antagonistic to bring the other male along: after all, ‘Boda was _much_ stronger than him, and it might appear as though Loki wanted muscle there, which would likely be ill-received by Thor. Loki also knew that he wouldn’t be able to have a remotely meaningful conversation with the Oaf if one of his friends was around, so he’d have to get the man alone. This probably meant that Loki’d have to do some stalking of his own… _nah_ , he’d just grab the man as soon as he walked out of the changing rooms. Easy as that.

And so it was, after football practice was over, that Loki waited patiently outside of the West Changing Rooms (the ones the rugby team were using since the football team had taken the East Changing Rooms (they’d started earlier, and those were also closer to their pitch)). He hid beside the door, if anybody asked him, he’d say that he was waiting for Svad. Out went Oaf’s friend, Fandral the Idiot (odd he didn’t wait for Oaf); then Sam; Eddie; T’Challa; Steve; Tony; Bastard (his friends called him Hogun); Svad (Loki told the surprised male that he was just taking a break from a post-football run to cool down and that Svad should go on ahead without him); Volstagg… that only left Thor. Odd that he’d take so long: then again, he was team captain, so he was in charge of airing the room out afterwards and making sure everything was spick and span.

Loki slid into the room, sure enough it was just Thor. The man looked up to see who had walked into the room, and his eyes widened. 

“Why’ve you been stalking me?” Loki asked, before Thor could so much as say a word.

“I- what?” Thor was unprepared for this, good, no false niceties.

“I’ve seen you around- sitting through my debate in disguise- eavesdropping on my conversations. So what is it, what gives?” Loki asked, his eyes set in a cold and condescending manner upon Thor’s own. Eye-contact, make _Thor_ subconsciously back down. Show him that Loki was the dominant party in this conversation.

“I’ve been checking to see if you were a threat.” Thor said, his shoulders shifting slightly back as he settled into a lie he was comfortable with. The man was a terrible liar, this spelled good news for the future of Jotunheimr, surely.

“And?”

“And now I can rest assured that Asgard has nothing to fear from Jotunheimr. Seriously, kid, you don’t really seem like the gang-type.”

Loki’s only weakness, _literally his only one_ , was his ego, and he would later come to regret how Thor’s words turned the conversation into an argument. In a sudden act of strength, Loki shoved Thor up against the lockers, Thor’s back pressing painfully into the keys. Loki didn’t _look_ strong, but he was. Oh Norns he was. He lifted Thor up slightly, ignoring the massive strain that it put on his muscles. “Well then I should be glad that Asgard’s future King is as dimwitted as you.” He let Thor drop, Thor only just managing to catch himself. “Stay away from me, Odinson, if you know what’s good for you.”

Thor, who was never one to back down from an act of physical violence (hence why _he_ belonged in gangs), swung his legs out to knock Loki down. Infuriated, Loki grabbed at Thor’s own shins. Thor rolled on top of the squiggling mite, trying to squash him, Loki refused to give in. Thor yelped as he felt a sudden pain on his forearm, where the little wretch had bitten him. Thor grabbed Loki’s neck, holding him down. They laid there for a full beat, Loki panting below him, Thor maintaining his hold, not wanting to get bitten again.

“Get off of me, you argr!” Loki hissed at Thor, eyes narrowed at the slightly older man. Thor’s eyes widened in surprise, quickly rolling off of Loki.

“That’s not what- this wasn’t-” Thor protested, but Loki had had it.

“Not everybody is as morally virtueless as the Aesir! If you want to go around bum-fucking people then go the fuck ahead! You Aesir are all damned to Hell anyways!” Loki stormed out of the changing rooms, slamming the door shut so hard that pieces of oak flew off of the frame as Thor shouted unintelligible words out after him.

He marched away, wanting to put as much distance between him and Thor Odinson as possible. And that’s when Thor’s last words to him finally registered. 

‘Says the fucking homosexual.’ No. Loki was not going to go back their and educate that fucking piece of scum. Loki knew he was straight. Everyone who had ever met Loki knew he was straight. There was no doubt in his mind at all that he was straight. _Look at him_! He had a fucking girlfriend who he planned to propose to in a few months! He played **_football_**! Homos didn’t do either of those things!

And Loki wasn’t one of those _toxically_ masculine men either! He didn’t hit his girlfriend! And he even acknowledged when other men were better than him- like Angrboda! He could admit that Angrboda was hotter than him, had more skills, was nicer, more down-to-earth and humble, funnier, had nicer eyes, had a nicer smile. Heck, at one point he might have even… you… no, never mind, it was unimportant, it was all in the past is what it was. The point was that Angrboda was a good-looking guy, and Loki was so comfortable in his heterosexuality that he could admit such a thing without it getting weird.

~~ Admit to how much he liked it when Angrboda brushed up against him. How that one time that they’d been trudging home in the rain and he’d gotten cold and ‘Boda’d given him his signature leather jacket to wear… how Loki’d loved the smell of the older boy on him. How Loki at one time, in the middle of a… _session_ … might have briefly thought about Angrboda… naked… in the changing rooms… ~~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be patient with Loki, he's been through a lot :(


	8. I can see it going down, going down…

When asked about his split lip and the bite marks on his arm, Thor had winked and said he’d gotten down and dirty with someone, but that he didn’t kiss and tell (a lie if anyone’d ever heard one). Sif had laughed at the notion of her best friend _ever_ being modest, but had eventually let it slide.

Despite his bruised jaw, Thor had _not_ taken heed of Loki’s advice. No. The younger male (odd to think of someone a few months younger than you in such a fashion) _needed_ his help. This was not about some saviour complex. This was about the venom in his tone when he spoke about homosexuality. **_Clearly_** he was repressed. There was a saying, wasn’t there, about how you could only ever truly hate yourself- that everyone else that you ‘hated’ was just a mirror being held up to you. Thor knew that that was why Loki hated homosexuals, had despised Thor for being bi…

Because Loki wished that he could live so brazenly himself. It made so much sense!

And besides, it was better for his gang that he keep an eye on their biggest rival. There was always that, in the event that Odin ever caught wind of Thor’s antics.

He didn’t do it so brazenly though, anymore. Oh no. Thor watched, but only in crowded hallways, where Loki could not accuse him of sneaking up on him. Loki, it seemed, came prepared. At all times he had his crush and girlfriend with him. 

Thor meanwhile would stare at him openly, inviting him to challenge it. He could tell it got on the younger man’s nerves, but also that he wouldn’t dare comment on it. Eventually, the little hothead took to staring back. No words were exchanged. Just pure silence, two figures glaring the fuck out of each other. Sif was annoyed, Angrboda was too. He constantly looked ready to fight Thor. Fandral thought the whole thing was amusing. Svadilfari daren’t say anything to his captain, not that he seemed particularly involved with that group anyways. Hogun constantly pleaded with Thor to stop, said that him provoking Loki could only lead to trouble… Those chicks that hung out with Loki clearly hated it- though he could tell that the dirty-blonde girl was kind of into it, from all the smirks she shot Thor’s way. The underage kid didn’t go to their school, but Thor figured that he’dn’t be into it… from the way the blonde dude ‘glared’ at Thor, Thor would have thought that he was _into him_! Which was odd because given Loki’s rant, Thor would have thought that he’d vehemently hate Thor (since they were both of Jotunheimr). Well, he was actually quite attractive, but Thor was a bit more focused on something else at the moment.

Oh, and Volstagg thought this whole thing was hilarious.

Thor sat on the lawn, tuning his guitar. Not for any reason in particular, he just felt like spreading out and making his presence known. And besides, football practice was due to start soon, and rugby afterwards.

Loki noticed him and went back to his practice, determined not to give the bastard the time of day. Who did he think he was, following him all over the damned place? And Loki had told him to leave him the hell alone. Grr… Thor Odinson got on _all_ of Loki’s last nerves. Such a dickhead.

.

Their university was having its annual music night to raise money for the music program. Thor snorted. EVERY GANG LEADER SENT THEIR KIDS HERE, THEY DIDN’T NEED FUNDRAISERS. Then, Thor supposed, nobody really wanted to admit that they let gangbabies into their university, nor that it was specifically founded _for_ gangbabies. 

It was a formal and black-tie event, so naturally _all_ gangbabies were being forced to go by their parents. Thor and Baldr (Asgard); his cousins Vali and Njord (Vanaheim); Bentley (Alfheim); Eitri (Nidavellir); Sindr (Muspelheim); Bonkeith (Svartalfheim); and Ardeus (Niffleheim- nobody would mess with him, on his gang alone. They were known for their torture methods). The event was student-only, or Thor had no doubt in his mind that Loki’s brothers would be here to clap him on.

Loki was playing. Hogun too, he played the cello. The conductor waved her stick- Thor never understood the point of conductors, they just waved a stick and, what, that helped people find where they were? Then again, Thor had never played in an orchestra, so really what did he know?

Thor watched Loki’s lips contorting to blow over the mouthpiece of the flute. He could see how hard he was blowing, he must have well-exercised lungs. That would give him an edge on holding his breath. 

_Snap out of it, Thor, you’re here to cheer on your friend not fantasise about your latest pet-project_.

They were playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto Number 15 in Bb major. Thor would _never_ admit it out loud, but yes he could recognise it from when he was little and his parents made him take piano lessons. Every time he heard someone play Für Elise he still had violent flashbacks to it all.

Loki was actually quite good, Thor noted. As they moved into the second song, one which Thor did _not_ recognise… okay, so maybe he knew that it was Syrinx, but who cares. The point was that Loki was front and centre, playing the flute solo, and Thor was watching, sitting forwards on his haunches, like a lion ready to pounce.

Baldr looked over at him. They hadn’t really been in close quarters in weeks. He missed his brother. Ooh! This was new. They seemed to have mixed Syrinx with Poulenc’s flute sonata. Loki was glorious. When he stopped playing the second round of applause for the night erupted.

Loki looked good in a suit and tie. Thor wondered why he’d never noticed that before. Hogun and some girl played something that was a cello and piano duet. The girl had long black hair that looked pretty curly. The Alice band looked like if she moved her head just a little it’d break. Weird creature that one.

Thor noted that Loki’s platinum blonde friend was also in the orchestra. She played the saxophone. His crush was also in it, playing the violin. Wait, weren’t the blonde girl and Angrboda dating? Oh, Loki must _hate her_. Spicy, Thor like.

Loki got bored during the performance, Thor could tell, and glanced over at Angrboda. Days ago, he might have wondered how Loki didn’t know that he was gay, but after the locker room incident he knew for certain that Loki knew full-well that he was gay. Thor didn’t know all that much about the toxic, homophobic atmosphere of Jotunheimr. Did they hate all homosexuals? Was it like in the old days where it was only shameful to be on the receiving end? He’d need to do some digging, but it would be difficult to not attract any attention. It’s not like he could ask Loki, despite how famously the pair of them got along.

His mother would know. She would _never_ betray his confidences. He twitched in his seat. It couldn’t be all that bad though, could it? He was pretty sure that some Jotnar were, at the least, _bi_. Besides, this was the 21st century, and Nine was a developed country, Norns dammit. True homophobia only existed in third-world countries, right? In the ones that hadn’t been close allies with the USA during the Cold War and were now grouped together as being financially destitute? 

Loki, Angrboda, and three others split between violins and flutes had a piece now, accompanied by frizzy haired piano chick. Thor reached into his suit pocket for some gum and cursed immediately, because that was in his normal, leather jacket, not this stupid suit one. Curse black tie events. Sif looked over at him, quizzically. Then, like the bff she was, reached into her clutch and threw him a piece using those long, black gloves of her. That black and red tube dress with the frills really suited her.

He popped in the watermelon and peppermint flavoured gum (odd combo, but it tasted quite nice) and chewed away, watching the performance. He absentmindedly blew a small bubble. A tiny pop erupted, barely noticeable, especially over the sound of the symphony.

But oh. Someone _did_ notice. And of all the someones to possibly notice, fate had picked _Loki_ to be that someone. He faltered on his flute bit, and that one **_was_** noticed. Loki maestro that he was, went along playing like nothing happened, but as soon as his bit was over, he looked up and glared directly into Thor’s eyes.

Thor snorted. So much for the little runt pretending like he didn’t exist.

.

Loki decided that he was going to talk to dickhead again. He had _intended_ to ignore Douche Odinson for the rest of their known lives, or at least until Jotunheimr seized control of Nine in six years (he had a whole flowchart waiting for Helblindi’s authorisation) and Thor Odinson alongside his Aesir compatriots were enslaved by Jotunheimr. However, that little gum-popping incident had nearly cost Loki his seat in the orchestra (good thing his father funded the school’s arts program), so forgive him if he wanted to tear the blond brat a new one.

“What is your _problem_!?” Loki hissed at him. He’d caught him coming out of one of his lectures (biology). His weird friend, the fat one, was with him. Thor signalled him to go, and he complied.

“What is it now, Laufeyson?”

“In the concert! When you popped gum!”

Thor held up his hands. “Sorry, just a habit. It wasn’t on purpose.”

Loki huffed, irritated at having to rethink his entire battle-strategy. Good thing h was so smart~. “What were you even doing at the concert? Seemed a bit too intellectual for you, it’s wasn’t a frat party.”

Rather than correct him on his knowledge, Thor just shrugged nonchalantly, not really in the mood for a confrontation after an in-depth lecture on the female reproductive system, which had included a video of childbirth. “All the gangbabies were there, surely you realised that much.” Aw, look at how cute Loki got when he was pouty. What a shame he was a Jotunn. Ah! Maybe **_that_** was what drew Thor so much to the man, the whole ‘forbidden-fruit’ thingamabob! That made sense!

Loki huffed. “So what were _you_ doing there, then?” That little bitch.

Thor rolled his eyes. “Well, if you’re done talking.” Loki grabbed his arm.

“I’m telling you one last time, Odinson, to stop it with the harassment. Stop following me.”

“I have no clue what you’re talking about.”

“I’m serious. If I see you ogling me _one more time_ on the soccer pitch, I’ll tell my father. And we all know how Jotunheimr deals with homosexuals.” Loki walked off.

Pssh. Bitch. Threatening Thor with imminent death? Did Loki even _know_ Thor?

.

Thor put on his noise cancelling earphones and blasted some My Chem (he’d never admit to liking the band- as far as his friends were concerned, Thor was into Nirvana or something… they didn’t actually talk about music all too much- point was, regardless of how emotionally impactful and brilliant their lyrics and chord progressions were, Thor had a _reputation_ to maintain, so despite how often My Chem songs had gotten him out of rough-times, he’d stick to pretending to like Nirvana and Coldplay or something.)

_Surrender the Night_ was playing. The song was a sad one, and yet for _some odd reason_ (Thor blamed the pesky rhythm) it always got him in _the mood_. In particular, the chorus, which was pretty sick because Thor was fairly certain that it detailed a car crash. ‘Sparks against the railing’, ‘through these windshields, sailing’, and ‘with these airbags failing’ all hinted towards that. So why did he want to jerk off?

He closed his eyes and relaxed, right hand finding its way into his pants as _Kill All Your Friends_ started. Weird jerking off to (again, what Thor considered to be) a social commentary on how people, regardless of how close, drift apart and only ever reunite for tragedies, such as funerals… yeah, no, he couldn’t do this. It was wrong. He opened his eyes in frustration, and double tapped his earphones to get them to change songs.

_In My Head_ , by Jason Derulo hit his ears. Ohhh, he loved this song! It was literally so good! He closed his eyes once more and put his hand back where it belonged. Mm, yeah, this was the stuff.

He moved his hand along his shaft, rhythmically. This was nice. His mind drifted, he cursed. It was always so much harder to orgasm when your train of thought kept shifting. He needed to focus on _one thing_ , just the _one_ fantasy.

He thought of Amora in a bikini, giving him a strip-tease… mmm, that was nice. Then his mind drifted off to Jane, and that time they’d had sex at that party at Fandral’s house. Oh, that one was nice too! He moved his hand. He couldn’t seem to hold steady onto a thought, which was weird. 

He thought of Loki then, with one of his smug, condescending looks. Loki’s hand was gripping him, tugging him along, he was bucking into it.

He came. 

Wow. That was weird. He didn’t often daydream over people he hadn’t slept with. He felt a brief flush of guilt, before shaking it off and getting up to go and towel himself off. If he didn’t get to bed he’d fail his Chem test the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, but like, I cannot be the only person who watched Umbrella Academy and heard 'We only see each other at weddings and funerals' and immediately went 'oMG! THAT'S A MY CHEM REF! FROM KILL ALL YOUR FRIENDS!' Gee knew what he was doing. He always knew what he was doing 😂And yes, I know those words don't appear in the song itself, but the sentiment's 'And we all get together when we bury our friends. It's been ten fucking years since I've been seeing your face round here...' etc.
> 
> Sorry. I have no life, and I think it shows in what I find interesting 😂


	9. In my head, I see you all over me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate title for this chapter: A girl who played rugby for ONE TERM a few years ago in high school, not during competition season, and was super scared of the ball the whole time and ran away from it now comes back and tries to write a chapter involving it.  
> (Remembers the girl whose neck got stepped on, who was told to just lie on the ground until it got better (it did get better, thank goodness!)): yeah, no. I made the right choice quitting.

TO CLARIFY, it wasn’t Loki’s idea to go to that stupid rugby game in the first place. But Svadilfari was his friend and the sport was important to him, and ‘Boda was going too, so it wouldn’t be awkward sitting there by himself.

It was ‘Boda’s idea- wait, he’d already mentioned ‘Boda, saying it was the man’s idea was a bit redundant.

Sigyn and Skadi were on a spa weekend in the hills (Vanir turf, but those grounds were mostly neutral. One could visit so long as they didn’t cause a ruckus). 

Loki, his oldest friend, and Logi stood in a corner and watched Svad be an absolute beast on the field. Loki didn’t know ANY of the positions in rugby, nor the rules, but he knew that MU was winning by a landslide. He could also be assured that, as with all sports games, the losing team would accuse MU of cheating afterwards. Psh, not their fault they had Svad. Literally, people on the other team flinched before approaching him. He was a scary-looking guy, no denying it. Rugged almost to a fault.

He watched that blond behemoth of an Asgardian boss everyone around, as though his word meant anything. Thor was a good player, Loki could afford him that much. He was fast, faster even than Svad (though significantly less bulky, so that might be it). He was cunning, agile… a good player. Loki snorted. Who’d have thought he’d have such nice things to say about such a giant dick.

His eyes shot to Thor’s crotch near instantly for no particular reason at all. He couldn’t see anything, so either Thor had a fantastic jockstrap or… Loki sniggered. Or Thor was compensating for his little tool by acting like a giant one.

Thor tackled the guy from DCU who had the ball- what was it called? Did it even have a special name? Anyways, Thor went down with the other guy with the beard and long hair, who looked a bit like a poor imitation of Thor if Loki were to be honest.

Thor had the ball and was running with it.

He passed it to Fandral behind him (yes, Loki knew the idiot’s name), who passed it right back to an open Thor, who took it in for a touchdown. 32-3. DCU couldn’t possibly win, not with only 5 minutes left. Loki made this known to Angrboda, who snorted.

“Lokes, it’s 5 minutes till _halftime_. There’s another 40 minutes after that.” ‘Boda ruffled the back of his own hair nonchalantly, in that cool way he did everything in.

“We have to wait here _forty-five_ _more minutes_.”

“Of course not. Halftime’s 20 minutes. It’s an _hour_ and five minutes.” Angrboda smirked.

Somewhere off to their left, Logi was getting drunk with a couple of other Jotnar: some of them Loki recognised as being Jarnsaxa’s friends. Speaking of: where was that cousin of his anyways?

The buzzer sounded. It appeared that DCU had made a score, 32-8. Loki didn’t quite get how these scores worked. He’d seen the board go up by 5 whenever someone made a touchdown, but then only by like 2 or 3 when people scored through other things, like kicking the ball through the post.

Around 10 minutes into halftime, Jarnsaxa showed up. Loki saw the state his cousin was in and quickly averted his eyes. He’d clearly just gotten into it with Kari over Norns-know-what now.

The game was back on. They’d put in a new guy: Loki frowned. He did _not_ look Varsity-aged… he also looked like he did steroids… though to be fair, one might think the same of Svad despite it not being true (one quick glance at Svad’s family and you’d see quite clearly that being _HUGE_ ran in their genes).

Mega Mammoth over there charged through everyone, some running out of the way in fear. But not Thor. No, good old Pork for Brains charged Mega Mammoth, holding the ball in his hands as he ran. He managed to sidestep him. Mega Mammoth tackled Thor. Loki glanced nervously at the two ambulances. No, Thor was good. He just released the ball immediately, and a man with a black crop-cut came and grabbed the ball. 

Within no time at all, the score had hit 32-33. Two minutes to go. Come on, come on. Loki’s knuckles were turning white from how hard he was clenching them. _Nobody_ could get past Mega Mammoth.

He saw Thor whisper something to one of his friends, who told Svad something too. A strategy, good. But Loki doubted it would help. He had no idea _why_ he was so invested in this match: rugby had always been a hard pass for him, _too violent_! And yet here he was, hoping someone would tackle Mega Mammoth so that MU would win.

They were off. It was a full-on brawl. Loki had never seen such savagery in his life, and he’d… no. Not now.

A bunch of men tried to tackle Fandral, but the blond slid past them easily, throwing the ball at Steve Rogers, who passed it to Thor right as Mega Mammoth was advancing on him. Thor would have to move quickly to get it in the scoring-section-thingy (Loki was going to have to do some homework on rugby). The man tripped him, but Thor managed to stay on his feet despite stumbling a little. The man grabbed at Thor’s leg, the impressive manoeuvre doomed from the start.

Thor kicked back a little, lunging forwards. A force of sheer brute strength, Loki’s heart thudded just a little there, watching in utter fascination as the jock made it to the scoring-area-thingy.

MU had won. There were 5 seconds left on the clock, MU had won. There was no time left, the game was over, MU had won. The DCU coach looked pissed, but hey, fuck him. Loki still low-key thought that the behemoth ought to get a drug test, and when he voiced his opinion to Angrboda, his friend agreed heartily with him. 

Loki didn’t think too much about how big Thor’s hands were on the way home. Why’d he waste his precious time on an ass-clown argr like Thor Odinson anyways? He masturbated too, but it was mostly to thoughts of his well-endowed girlfriend, honest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Looooookiiii 😂  
> Also: is it common to have ambulances at hand during rugby matches, or is that just a thing in my country? (Might not even be a country thing, might just be a school thing).


	10. In my head, you fulfil my fantasies

DATE NIGHT! It had been a while since Loki had gotten any alone time with Sigyn.

He looked at his beautiful girlfriend, in her beautiful red dress, with her beautiful hair in a bun, and a beautiful diamond necklace around her neck. Real diamonds too, the Jotnar were far from poor folk, those would be the Dökkálfar. 

Loki was taking her to a fancy Italian place. They both liked pasta, and _Da_ _Roma_ also had _fantastic_ mood lighting. Loki kissed Sigyn on the cheek as he greeted her at her door. She moved in to kiss him on the lips, which he accepted. He then took her hand and began to walk her down.

Her diamond necklace didn’t put them at risk of being attacked. Loki was Laufey’s son, hated as he was, nobody would dare lay a finger on him, nor on his women. The only woman a Jotunn could harm was his wife. Loki’d been taught that quite well by his father since he was a kid. It was disgusting. He hoped Helblindi would implement laws against it. _Most_ young Jotnar didn’t seem to care for it, though there were still some pieces of trash like Logi and Kari and ‘em.

“How’s the trip with Skadi?” Loki asked her, putting on a smile, barely paying attention as she recounted all the treatments they’d received: a bath in liquid gold, a face mask or something… hair protein what? Oh well, he just liked listening to her speak sometimes, she had a soothing voice.

The restaurant was on Jotunn soil, though just barely. It was near the border shared with both Midgard and Vanaheim, and in fact it was a Vanir woman who owned it. Her name was Ran, she was married to a Jotunn, Aegir, who was the head chef. Loki thought that they were quite cute together. Loki’d first met Ran as a little kid, back when Ran was still going through her hippy-phase. He was glad she’d made a success of herself, but to be quite honest he sometimes missed her hippy-phase, back when she used to wear those big, poofy, rainbow-coloured outfits, and hand out cookies to kids (after obtaining their mother’s permission first, of course). Such a vivacious character she was back then. She was still stunning now, of course. Wow, look at Loki rambling on about Ran.

“Laufeyson.” He told the lady at the front desk. She nodded and gestured a waiter over. He was a handsome man, with dreadlocks and a firm chest, all dressed up in an expensive, form-fitting suit. Loki didn’t recognise him, he must be new. He took them to their table. A nice little window-side one.

“So, how’ve things been for _you_ lately?” Sigyn grinned at him, flashing her pearly whites.

“Hectic. 400 pages I have to read for our next assignment.” He rolled his eyes. “Curse Mimir.”

“Isn’t he an uncle of yours?”

“Yeah, mom and Thrym’s _other_ brother, the one who turned away from gangbanging to pursue a life in academia.” Loki feigned a yawn. “ _Bo_ -ring!”

Sigyn laughed, her eyes gleaming in delight. “Would you disown Narfi and Vali if they left the Jotnar.”

“In a heartbeat.” Loki said, a taught dead serious expression on his face, designed for comical relief. Sigyn laughed, he liked it when she was laughing. She had a nice laugh. “How goes nursing school?”

“It’s fine. They were showing us how to check somebody’s pulse last week.” Sigyn had just started nursing school.

“That’s cool. Now you’ll finally be able to tell if I’m dead or not.”

“Har, har.” She smiled at him. “So.”

“So…?”

“We’ve been dating a while.”

“If you count three years as a while.” He hummed, pleasantly.

“Our anniversary is coming up.”

“14th of February, Valentine’s Day.”

“Indeed. I was thinking we could go up to my father’s lake house in Vanaheim.”

“With…?”

“Nobody.” She smiled. “Just the two of us.”

“Scandalous.” Loki said, ignoring the sweat on his forehead. Natural to be a little nervous when your girlfriend was asking you out for what would undoubtedly be the first of many sex-cations. He’d never gone anywhere overnight with just one person, let alone into enemy territory. “You’re not worried about the possibility of a Vanir attack?”

“What for? The Vanir and the Light Elves are the most peaceful peoples in Nine. Why, nervous?”

“No, of course not.” He said, his tone indicating that he was relaxed and nonchalant about the whole thing. “I’ll have to seek permission for this from my father, but anything for you, dear.”

“Perfect.”

They looked at their menus. They tended to share meals, great friends that they were. They got a ham and bacon and cheese spaghetti, and some swordfish. They ate their meal silently, neither one keen on choking. As they waited for dessert, Sigyn got a bit footsy with him and ran her high-heeled shoe over his clothed dick. Loki moved slightly out of the touch, a lurch in his gut.

Their waiter arrived then, Loki gulping as his set down the dessert close to Loki, so close his hand nearly brushed Loki’s chest. Loki didn’t like it when strangers invaded his personal space, that was it. The back of his neck sweated slightly as the waiter cleared up the table and took their empty dishes back, leaving them with their Tiramisu. 

“I’m not crazy, right? He’s new.”

“Who? Our waiter? Oh yeah, remember those crazy, rabid Aesir from that club fight?” Sigyn **_hated_** the Aesir, it was why Laufey was so happy she was his intended. “Remember the fucking bitch with the dark hair? Get this, _apparently_ that’s her brother. Not half-brother, oh no, _full_ brother.”

“Oh… that’s odd… but it could happen. Probably rare, but it could happen. Wait, if he’s Asgardian, why’s he on our side of town?”

Sigyn sniggered. “Rumour has it he ran away with a girl. She got banished from Asgard, so he followed her out.”

“But once in a gang, always in a gang. You can’t _switch_ gangs.”

“He’s not in one anymore, he’s on his own. He’s a free man, he just happens to work here. Besides, his mom’s Vanir, so it’s not inconceivable to believe that he’d be working a job at a restaurant owned by a Vanir woman.”

“True, true.” Loki nodded. This was why he liked Sigyn, she always had all the dirt on the people around her. Five times as useful as anyone else in Jotunheimr. Except, maybe, for Angrboda, but he was a gossip-monger too. He didn’t advertise it, but Loki knew that the other boy had his eyes everywhere. “Who’s the girl?”

“You know that Amora girl? The one with the blonde hair.” Loki shook his head, he wasn’t overly invested in the Aesir. “Well, then, this’ll be hard to explain. But basically her little sister.”

“Oh? Wait, how little?” Sigyn snorted.

“A year younger than her, used to go to MU, dropped out when she was kicked out because she couldn’t afford the fees.”

“Well that’s sad.” Not that Loki really cared. Fuck the Aesir.

“Yeah. I think Skadi said she enrolled in the local community college- you know, since it’s free. Anyways, she was studying business, I believe.” Sigyn prattled on as Loki took a spoon of his Tiramisu. They were, naturally, keeping their voices down so that their waiter wouldn’t hear them discussing him.

When the bill came, Loki added a tip, and they left. This was the part he tended to dread a bit, the bit where they decided what to do for the rest of the night. Not that Loki was complaining, of course, he had the most beautiful girl in Jotunheimr on his arm, what was there to complain about? It really was just the fear of not knowing what was coming next. That was all it ever was, truly.

Sigyn wanted to have sex. They didn’t always have sex. Loki insisted that it cheapened things. I mean, of course they had sex, it would’ve been a bit odd (though not wrong if that’s what somebody wants, because it’s your body, your choice, and nobody has the right to take that away from you) to go out for three years and _never_ have sex. It’s just that the sex wasn’t frequent. But Loki should have guessed that Sigyn wanted sex from her rubbing his dick with her shoe at the restaurant. So naturally they went back to Loki’s (Laufey wasn’t home, neither was Helblindi), and had sex in Loki’s room.

Loki placed a condom over his penis, not wanting Sigyn to get pregnant. She took a pill, he did too, but you could never be _too_ safe. Loki kissed her and played with her breasts like she liked, then prepared her and took her. They did it missionary. Loki closed his eyes and came. Then Loki got up and took off the condom and tossed it in the bin and they laid there for a while and then Sigyn got up. “I’ve got to go or my parents will worry. See you, sweetie!”

“See you too!” Loki got up and led her out the door. He sighed as she left, and got into the shower so that he could scrub himself clean, then tossed his sheets into the laundry and went to sleep.


	11. In my head- you’ll be screaming, oh

Svartalfheim was a dark, dingy, dodgy place. The streets were red, or at least one kind of imagined that they were when looking at them at night. During the day they were mostly grey and drabby and _full_ of homeless people and others dressed in rags. What else could one expect from Nine’s poorest gang?

Their leader was Malekith the Accursed. An unpleasant man with a long nose, who despite his odd features was oddly handsome. All Elves were handsome- Light and Dark- legend had it one of the goddesses of Nine had bestowed their founding ancestor a boon for rescuing her from a dragon, and he’d asked for the most beautiful wife in the world… and then they’d had two sons who’d been at each other’s heads since birth and the Elf gangs had splintered off into the Light Elves (sons of Amadeus) and the Dark Elves (sons of Marekith).

Svartalfheim had been poor for four generations now. But that was all set to change. Malekith was a smart man, and he had a plan. A plan to take over all of Nine and usurp Asgard’s spot. It wasn’t even a difficult one. All he would need would be to get Asgard and Jotunheimr to fight. They had allies. Svartalfheim would declare itself neutral in the ensuing chaos. By the end of it all, the two even-ish-ly matched allies would have little-to-no gang members left alive, and then Svartalfheim could take over, because their allies’ numbers would have fallen significantly as well.

He summoned his nephew and heir apparent (he’d have kids later, he reasoned). “Bonkeith. Have you and your friends gotten the uniforms I’ve asked for?” Nemean Leather. It was the Jotnar’s signature leather. The one every member wore, exclusive to Jotunheimr. You got it on your 18th, at a swearing-in ceremony, where you pledged your eternal fidelity to your gang.

“Yes, uncle.” Bonkeith nodded. Bonkeith’s name was Bonkeith because no commoner could have the suffix ‘kith’. You had to be a king or the king’s firstborn son, those were the rules. Were Malekith to drop dead, Bonkeith would become Bonkith. Simple as that.

“Good boy,” Malekith ran a long, slender and up his nephew’s face. “Meet with Godfrey and the other mercs to hand them over.”

“Of course, uncle.” Bonkeith bowed and took his leave.

.

The situation at school was slowly ebbing out. Thor was making every possible excuse to walk past Loki, get the other man to notice him.

He’d pass him in the halls even if it meant not taking the fastest route two a class he was late for. He’d passed him in the cafeteria. In the library. On the grounds. _In the bathroom_ (though that one had just been a happy accident).

Loki was going to crack eventually, Thor knew. He’d get sick of what they currently had, and he’d talk to Thor. And then Thor could work on getting rid of his internalised homophobia… was it still internalised if you were fully aware of it? Thor did not know. Actually, he wasn’t sure what ‘internalised homophobia’ was _exactly_ , but he could always check Urban Dictionary for it later.

.

Thor sat at the table, eating his breakfast. He flicked through the news absentmindedly on his phone. 8 people had died in some incident. It appeared to have involved drugs and a fire dance party. Oh, it was in Muspelheim, big surprise there.

Not.

Just the other day, someone from their own gang had died playing Russian Roulette. Baldr joined Thor, still dressed in his pyjamas. Baldr had a lecture in like an hour didn’t he? Thor ate his cereal. He was sure his brother would be ready by then. He sniffed the air. Baldr stank. Baldr needed a wash. Oh well, he’d probably get one.

“Brother! How are you?” 

Baldr looked up at him with dead eyes. “Alright and you?”

“Great, thanks for asking!” Thor replied, both oblivious and chipper as ever. “See you at school, kid!”

“Thor, can I-” Baldr stared at the closed door and put his head on the table, back in his slump. Oh well, he could always try again tomorrow or something like that.

.

It was 9 o’clock, nighttime. Brutus and Godfrey strode into Asgard, fearing nothing. They were here to cause trouble, dressed as Jotnar. There were four more with them: Alexei, Ratkeith (Bonkeith’s cousin), Glybja, and Wester (Mark, but everyone called him ‘Wester’).

Alexei and Ratkeith were waiting with their guns. They were going to kill a random person, an Asgardian, that’s what they were here for. Brutus and Godfrey were there to be seen, so they’d be the one shouting slurs at the Aesir and creating mayhem in general. Glybja and Wester were going to stone a jewellery store and steal some stuff, _after_ drawing the Jotunn emblem on the wall of said store. It was brilliant. And the idiot Aesir were so certain in their untouchability that they naturally had no guard present. It was almost too easy. Really ought to be illegal.

Bonkeith could not be seen. Everyone knew he was the heir to Svartalfheim, it would compromise their whole mission. It was why they had to use a special force of people, kept out of the public eye the last five years, unremarkable facial features which were plastered in makeup anyways.

A portly man in an apron closed up his bakery for the night. Brutus knew that the man was gay. Jotunheimr was famously homophobic. It literally could not be more perfect. He gestured wildly. Ratkeith nodded and fired his bullet. There was a shout. They moved fast, not wanting people to come out and see what had happened.

Fifteen minutes and they were out of there. How convenient was it when people in cars never stopped to help people fallen over on sidewalks. Pretty bloody convenient. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good grief, I sure hope that this doesn't impact anything on the #Thorki front 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣 LMAO, of course it will! ;)


	12. In my head, it’s going down, in my head, it’s going down, in my head

Thor was furious. It was a common sentiment in Asgard.

Mjoll Mjollson had been murdered. By _Jotnar_. Shops had been broken into and the lower part of town ravaged, but the most pressing matter was the death of a loving husband and son, and the grief in the community.

Thor felt as though he had a right to be more furious than anyone else. Asgard was his home, he was her heir, since his birth he’d been raised knowing that these were his people and that he was to fight for them and possibly even lay down his life and protect them.

And that he would do. That he had every damned intention of doing. The Jotnar would pay for this, hands down.

.

When Thor pinned Loki to the lockers in his locker room, it was not for sexy times, and had _nothing_ to do with attraction. No. This was just pure, unadulterated, platonic hate.

“Which one of your cronies killed Mjoll?” Loki didn’t respond a second too long and Thor shook him. “Answer me, you bastard!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about!”

“Don’t be an idiot! There were eye-witnesses, the assailants were _Jotnar_! It’s best if you tell me before I just go ahead and murder every single one of you.”

“Gang threats, you could get expelled.” Loki wheezed.

“It’s not a threat, it’s a promise. Now answer me.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, nor who. Our gang is not engaged in any wars, presently. Your moronic compatriots were probably seeing things, aren’t you all drunk by like 2 pm anyways?”

“I am serious, son of Laufey.” Thor let Loki go. “As soon as I find out who did this, they will all meet a gruesome end, and so help _anyone_ who stands in my way.”

Loki twisted his shoulder around, bending it to see if it still moved, ignoring the flutter in his chest. Fear of what Thor had just said ran through him. What had happened. He hadn’t even been aware that _any_ gangs were committing violence- and he certainly didn’t know which one would be stupid enough to commit violence against the Aesir. They were the most powerful gang in Nine, after all. He figured that he ought to speak to ‘Boda about this.

.

It was by (unfortunate) luck that Thor even passed Angrboda on his way to a chemistry lecture. The man was sniggering with that girlfriend of his. Angrboda looked up at him, not a hint repentant or remorseful. He then turned back to his girlfriend and laughed some more.

“Heard some gay baker got shot.” The blonde chortled.

“Yeah. Hopefully the next person to die’ll be _Jotunn_.” Thor growled. Angrboda narrowed his eyes, unappreciative of the tone that Thor had taken with his girlfriend, despite having had been gleeful about the _death_ of another man just moments prior.

“Watch your tone.”

“Oh, and who’s going to make me? _You_? I’d snap you like a twig.”

“I’d crush you like the bug you are.”

“Put your money where your mouth is, oh harm-bidder.” Thor challenged. “Meet me at Gast’s, nine. Bring your second man.”

“You’re on, Odinson.” Angrboda hissed venomously. The fucking blonde bitch was probably getting off on this (if Thor remembered right, her name was Skadi. Who cared, all Jotnar were the same: scum).

.

9 PM in the Gast Burger Parking Lot just outside of MU’s neighbourhood. It was dark, pitch-black save for a single, flickering streetlight. There were two cars in the lot, though no apparent owners. Must’ve either been abandoned, or abusing the free parking. Whatever. That’s not what Thor was here for.

The scene had danger written all over it. Fandral and Thor waiting, bullet-proof vests on just incase those Jotunn scum tried anything.

Fights were simple. Each party had two people, and it was fists only. Thor had a knife on him just incase, his last knife-wounds only having had recently healed. He’d discard it once he was certain that the other two weren’t armed. If they ever showed up. 

An engine revved, and Thor watched the two arrive. Naturally, Angrboda’d brought that huge friend of his. Thor snorted. Svadilfari was a good rugby player-ish, but not a good fighter. Brawns didn’t always make up for skill, not even in a fight. And given that Fandral could take Volstagg in a fight, he doubted that Svadilfari stood a chance.

“No weapons?” Angrboda asked. Thor took out his knife and tossed it aside. Angrboda did the same. Fandral and Svadilfari both did the same too.

Fights typically went on until one or both parties were physically incapable of moving. They were highly illegal, but gangs didn’t play by society’s laws anyways. The reason they were so illegal is because, spoiler alert, even without guns or knives, you could still easily kill someone in a fight like this. Thor knew at least 4 people who’d gone out like this, and knew _of_ at least 8 more. He wasn’t scared though. If this all ended badly, he knew it wasn’t going to be him or Fandral laying in a casket 6 feet under. 

This was for Mjoll. This was to teach the Jotnar that they didn’t get to fuck with Asgard and go unpunished. 

Thor and Fandral were a team unlike any other. Angrboda lunged to punch Thor, but Thor ducked out and used the opportunity to punch Angrboda in the stomach. Angrboda then flipped Thor down. Thor rolled them over and swung a punch at Angrboda’s face. Svadilfari pulled him off. Fandral clawed at the 300lbs man’s legs. They were so gonna lose the next rugby match.

Fandral managed to tackle Svadilfari, while the man was pulling Thor’s hair, which took Thor off of Angrboda. Thor jumped back up and head-butted Svadilfari as Fandral punched and pulled at the man repeatedly, before turning back to Angrboda. 

Angrboda clawed at his face, Thor elbowed him to the gut, kicking around for his balls. Angrboda flipped Thor over his back, as though Thor didn’t weigh more than him, and Thor rolled them around to step on his leg. Angrboda bit the arm Thor was using to choke him, punching him in the face. Many punches were thrown. Angrboda kicked Thor in the nutsack, Thor kicked him in the back of his head. Sirens sounded in the distance, but they were all too gone to care. It seems that they had drawn in a crowd. 

The last thing that Thor remembered was Svadilfari choking him from behind while Angrboda was punching him in the face.


	13. Pshh, yeah, in my head, oh

Thor woke up with his head pounding. He was in a hospital room, his mother and brother both hovering over him. 

“Son!” Frigga exclaimed.

“He’s awake?” Aunt Freyja. 

“Not for long.” His father growled. He was surprised his father was here. He knew he loved him, but with the current situation in Asgard he didn’t think his father would have been able to take the time off. He was also suddenly very afraid. Odin had a temper, and Thor knew he’d royally fucked up. Ironic when you thought about that sentence long and hard…

“Odin, he has just woken up.” Frigga warned, and Thor could see his father internally debating, before getting up and leaving, evidently not trusting his anger. Fuck. “Thor, what were you thinking?”

“They killed Mjoll, mother. And then I heard one of them laughing about his death, so I _had_ to fight him, and I-” his mother’s face stayed unimpressed. “Mother?”

“Thor, son, this was a stupid move on your part. Have you any idea how many police officers your father’s had to bribe over this? He had to pay a newspaper agency money to buy the rights to this story from them.”

“So? Asgard has the money.”

“ _Thor_.” His mother frowned and shook her head. “Whatever. I’m glad you’re alright. The doctor says you’ll be fine in a few weeks. Good as new with a few rock treatments. But you’ll be in crutches at least a week.”

Rocks were this healing thing, some type of medicine Thor’d be learning about in three years. Not now, but in three years. Point was, they were a new technology developed by Nine, their effects not widely known, and they sped up _and improved_ the healing process by a lot.

“Brother, we thought you were dead.” Baldr said, combing his hand through Thor’s hair. Wait.

“What happened to my hair?” Thor asked, alarmed at how short Baldr’s stroke was. Perhaps Baldr had taken his fingers out early? Baldr winced and looked away.

His aunt tsked. “Thor, you almost lost your life. There are more important things about hair. Aesir men, _honestly_!”

“Thor, they had to cut it off.” Frigga said. “Large parts of your scalp were badly wounded, and your hair had been roughly pulled. It was that or leave you with bald spots.”

His life was over.

.

Loki hopped out of his brother’s car with the bitch, the cunt, and Logi. Angrboda and Svadilfari were being kept up in the same hospital room, so they could see them together. Loki’s fingers itched as they walked in. He had so much to say, but not to who one might assume. No. He had a lot of telling off to do to one Mr. Thor Odinson.

Jarnsaxa and Skadi immediately swarmed Angrboda. Angrboda looked up at Loki, who smiled and asked his oldest friend if he was alright.

“Never better.” Angrboda grinned, and Loki was relieved to see his best-friend hadn’t lost any teeth.

“Why did you get into a fight?”

“He challenged me.” ‘Boda would have shrugged, but Loki was willing to bet his arms were bruised to the point of that action alone being too painful. Poor ‘Boda, Loki ruffled his friend’s hair affectionately, ‘Boda smiled up at him. Skadi, ever jealous of the bond the two friends shared, shimmied up on ‘Boda’s other side and sat her ass on the bed, ‘Boda wrapped an arm around her waist absentmindedly, to pull her close. Jarnsaxa, the ever faithful friend, rubbed Angrboda’s feet.

“So brave, sweetie.” Skadi purred. “I love how you stuck it to him. I bet he’s probably dead.” Loki should have been elated to hear that assertion. Instead he felt dread. This was so dumb. He had no reason to dread Thor’s death. He’d shot people for less than anything Thor had ever done, and he’d killed people he knew better than that blond brat.

“Hope not. Wouldn’t want to go to jail for murder.” Angrboda rolled his eyes. “Though if he dies three days later in an _unrelated_ way, that’s another story entirely.”

Loki laughed along with the others. Pretty soon it turned awkward. ‘Boda and Skadi got to chatting and kissing, ‘Saxa left to hang out with Svad (which was odd given how much ‘Saxa looked down on the boy).

“I’m gonna go grab a soda.” Loki said, hopping up. ‘Boda looked at him, and watched him leave, before turning back to Skadi.

Loki’s first point of order was to get Thor’s room number. He grabbed a soda and a bag of chips and went to the front desk. “Umm… hi, Ms.” He greeted. “Can you help me, I’m lost?” He knew women were drawn to him, and that it was easy for him to manipulate them (and men too, but that was irrelevant right now), and had every intention of abusing that fact.

“Oh sure, hon. Where do you need to get?”

“I was here to see my cousin, Thor.” He’d be on the fourth floor, that’s where ‘Boda was. “I went down to grab some snacks, then went back up to the fourth floor and forgot which room he was in.”

The lady bit her lip. “You’re not a pap, are you?”

He blinked blankly and shook his head. “Uh, no. You can pat me down if you want though, check for any cameras.” He winked.

She eyed him suspiciously. “Well, I suppose Odinson’s well-enough. If you _are_ a papo, just say you snuck in though.”

“Will do.” He winked at her.

Like putty in his fingers.

.

Loki waited for everyone from Thor’s camp to leave, making himself discrete and going back in to ‘Boda and Svad’s room to give himself an alibi. Eventually, when the coast was clear, Loki made his way into Thor’s room. The man was laying on his bed, the left side of his face swollen, bite marks on his arms, half his chest wrapped up, his hair shorn, his leg in a cast, and his eye swollen up too. He looked a pathetic sight… as he… should be.

“Who- _Loki_?” Thor’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head, a stern glare settled on his face. Thor did not want to see any Jotnar right now, probably not ever again for that matter. “What are you doing here?”

Loki ignored what that angry voice did to him, and looked at Thor as though he wasn’t shit-scared. “I don’t know _what_ happened to that baker, but I **_know_** it wasn’t any Jotnar because nobody’s fessed up to it.” Thor opened his mouth but Loki waved him quiet. “I’m here to tell you that although no Jotnar have killed any Aesir _yet_ , if you don’t back off and stay away from me and my friends, one Jotunn has _no problem_ killing one specific Asgardian. Do I make myself clear?” He asked, gaze steely. Thor nodded, stiffly. “I don’t know where your little, homosexual mind draws boundaries, but I’m here to help _set one for you._ Fuck off, Odinson.”

“You’re the one in my hospital room. Why’re you here anyways?”

“Because ‘Boda and Svad, who **_you_** attacked are here too. Don’t flatter yourself into thinking that I would take a bus to this place for you. Ever.”

“Didn’t claim you did. And thanks.”

“For what?”

“Denying the Jotnar attack. Now I know it’s someone close to you.” Thor said, eyes narrowed. “And don’t think for even a moment that your threats scare me. Because once I find out who did it, I will kill them myself, no gun needed.”

Loki fumed. “You just don’t understand it, do you! _It’s not us!_ ”

“They were wearing Jotunn Leather! They drove an old JT616 motorbike.” Thor laughed, mirthlessly. “You think I am a fool?!”

“ _Yes_!”

“And the **_joy_** you bastards took in killing a gay man? _There is only_ ** _one_** _homophobic gang in Nine_!” Thor boomed so hard the room shook. Literally. Loki clutched his chest, it felt like thunder had stricken the building.

“Maybe they didn’t know he was gay.”

“‘Fag’, you bastard. That’s what they wrote on his bakery’s wall. Who. Are. You. Defending?”

“ ** _Nobody_** , Odinson!” Loki hissed. “Are you so blind that you can’t see that?”

“Are _you_ so blind that you can’t see what’s right in front of you?”

Loki shook his head. “You’re an idiot. I came to say my piece. Stop stalking me. Goodbye.” Loki left before the duffer could spew another word.

Thor didn’t even feel satisfaction in the fact that Loki had sought _him_ out, had come to him, and had cared enough about their last conversation to bring it up. Nope. He refused to feel the satisfaction. He had a boner, but he refused to- okay, a small smile never hurt anybody.

.

When Thor was eventually discharged home, he saw a moving van.

His father had kicked him out. He was a ‘bad influence on Baldr’, and Odin was rehousing Thor in an apartment in Midgard.

Great. Just great. He called Odin a coward just _one time_ while still in hospital and this was what he got? Okay… so it was a bit more than that, and he’d called him a horrible leader for not razing Jotunheimr over Mjoll’s death (he’d called Thor impulsive, Thor’d called him a fool). The point was, that this sucked and Thor hated it.

His mother kissed him on the forehead. “We can’t risk another war… Thor you’ll never be able to understand what Nine was like before your father took control of it… your actions were foolish. Please, son. Go to Midgard, show your father that you’re the man he raised you to be.”

“Am I now not what he has raised me to be?”

“Less hot-headed would help.” She smiled, wryly. “I’ll check on you everyday if you want, sweetheart. You can even have a friend move in with you, it’s two-bedroom!”

“Fandral got kicked out too, didn’t he?”

“Yes.” Frigga admitted, sheepishly. She kissed him again. “Good luck, sweetie.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magic healing stones... guys, I HAD to! It's not fair, action movies magically heal people all the time, why can't I do it too? 😂They would've healed SO SLOW and never have been able to play their sports again if I'd have just let them be!


	14. Yeah, c’mon

Laufey sat at his throne, back from his meetings abroad. Laufey was a 6”5, hulking, broad-shouldered man with a goatee and a pair of thick, black eyebrows to go along with his amber eyes. You could tell he was back because the whole house felt like death once more. Loki shuddered, coming home. Loki’s house was castle-sized, but what could one expect? It doubled as Jotnar HQ. Laufey was a big fan of working everywhere. _Everywhere_. They’d never even had a family vacation where Laufey wasn’t working. Good thing they had a chauffeur. 

Laufey’s ‘throne’ consisted of an elegant, office-chair that was at least a hundred years old; and the ‘throne-room’ was a large, cavernous room, about two storeys tall, that was painted all shades of blue, and had a light-blue, marble wall. The Jotnar liked blue. Along the wall were hung animal heads and other spoils of war. For example, Bor’s gun, which was taken from the Aesir about 199 years ago, and Aelsa’s crown, taken about 180 years ago from the original Queen Aelsa. In the centre of the ceiling hung a large, crystalline chandelier that was at least 8-Lokis big (accounting for both height and girth, and going under the assumption that Loki’d be standing with his arms and legs glued to his sides, because obviously if he were spread out it’d be fewer Lokis).

“Two of your friends were involved in a brawl.” The suited man said, disapprovingly. 

“Angrboda and Svadilfari fought two Aesir, one of whom is the Aesir heir. It was a dispute over who had murdered an Aesir baker.” Loki bowed his head slightly when talking to his father. He’d always been scared of him, more so in the past two years.

“Murdered baker?” Laufey questioned. Why would any of his own go off and kill a baker? And why was it fight-worthy?

“Some Jotnar appear to have trespassed onto Aesir territory. They killed a man and looted a few stores.”

Laufey growled and nodded. “Why do they assume it was us?” Jotnar weren’t common criminals, that was the Dökkálfar.

Loki recalled Thor’s words. “They were reportedly wearing Nemean Leather, and they left homophobic slurs graffitied into the man’s bakery window.”

“The man was gay?”

“Yes.”

“Good. One less faggot in the wold.” Laufey sniffed. “Odin will, undoubtedly, seek compensation, greedy thing that he is. Keep a wide berth between yourself and his son.” Laufey wrinkled his nose in distaste. He did not like the Odinson, for more reasons than one. 

Forget being a homosexual- a _bi_ sexual was at least 8 times worse.

“Yes, father.”

Loki headed upstairs to his bedroom, keen to take a shower and rid himself of whatever germs he’d picked up at the hospital. He stepped into his obsidian-coloured bathroom and stripped himself of his garments, taking a piss in the toilet as the water ran till it got hot. Loki stepped into his shower and slathered himself in Gast Wash: the only wash to make the girls Gast. It was funny because it was supposed to be ‘gasp’, but… never mind.

His thoughts kept drifting back to that argument with the big dummy. Why did he even care, who gave a fuck about what Thor Odinson thought?

He thought of Thor laying there, injured and bruised, but where there ought to have been a sense of smug satisfaction that the bastard who’d been harassing him the past few weeks had been given a good kick, there was also a little pit of dread where he stood hoping that Thor would get better. It literally made no sense at all. And why should he care about someone he’d had a total of, what, _five_ conversations with? _And look at how many had ended in fights._

Loki rinsed his hair with his _Excerbar’s Magnifique Deep-Wash Shampoo_ , getting it good and deep, before putting on the brand’s deep conditioning conditioner. It was why his hair was so perfect… well, for one day after he washed it anyways. Greasy hair wasn’t easy, but it fit in with his lifestyle.

He wrapped a towel around himself, walking across the marble tile to his bedroom.

He hated this house. There. He said it. He didn’t even feel bad. He imagined some SJW berating him for complaining about having a roof over his head, but he didn’t care, wasn’t their right to tell him how to feel. He **_hated_** this place.

He laid down on his bed and stared at the ceiling. He stretched about and eventually fell asleep.

It was a fitful one though. No surprises there, not when Laufey was around.

_Blood. Screaming. Oh he looked so tortured, didn’t he?_

_His eyes boring into Loki’s._

_‘What are you waiting for?’ Dream-Laufey’s head morphed into that of a wolf, Loki pointing his gun at his brother. ‘Go ahead.’_ Loki woke up, heart racing. He checked his clock. Oh wow, he’d managed to sleep 5 hours? _Five whole hours_ it had taken him to get to his first nightmare? With Laufey around? Must be a new record.

Loki lay back down and tossed and turned. It was 03:05, he had school the next day, but he wasn’t very tired, no. He pushed his covers off, but then it got too cold, so he put them back on, turning around onto his side, but now he was sweating. He brushed aside his hair, and breathed frustratedly into his pillow, lifting a lock of his hair with the gust of wind caused by said breath. He grunted and kicked the bed hard, but doing so sideways only caused him to mostly hit his other leg.

Loki got up. He could probably sleep better with clothes on. He threw on some pyjamas and went back to bed.

But he still. Couldn’t. Sleep. Dammit. Loki stared out of his window, longingly. Maybe a quick walk outside would help him feel tired again?

Loki hopped out of his house, still dressed in his shorts and tee. The climb down from his window was always a thrilling one. 

Jotunheimr was beautiful. It may not be as rich as Asgard or Vanaheim, but Loki was willing to bet it was twice as beautiful. It was just this whole gothic-vibe to it, coupled with the fact that the Jotnar were skilled workmen in their own right. Who’d been contracted to build MU in the first place? _The Jotnar_. Who built Rutgers Palace? _The Jotnar_. Who had built Asgard’s Great Wall, only to be conned out of a payment, inciting a three-centuries-ish-long-feud? _The Jotnar_.

Loki loved the sea-breeze one could pick up just standing on Maple Hill. He loved the fisheries, the bookstores, the cafes, the museums… there, he said it. He was a basic bitch.

Jotunheimr didn’t have many museums. Just the two, but Loki still thought that they were worth a visit. Despise his fellow gang members he might, but one could not deny that the Jotnar were an interesting peoples with an interesting history to boot.

The whole neighbourhood was bathed in different hues of blue. At times mismatched, but nonetheless beautiful. Loki walked along the streets. His people weren’t dying, they weren’t rich, but they weren’t dying. At least not like the Dark Elves were. Talk about _poverty_.

The streets were nice like this. Usually they were filled with rowdy men, and rowdier women, blocking the streets up, smoking, drinking, fighting, shouting… bit of a mess. But at night it was a different story entirely. At night, Jotunheimr was beautiful. At night, with all the lights out, one could see the stars. Not too many, but enough to make a smile pop up on Loki’s face. He must’ve been out for an hour, he started making his way back to his house. Quickly, before his father noticed that he was gone.

He scaled the wall and re-entered the building, closing his window behind him and locking it for good measure. He flopped back down onto his bed, exhausted, and checked the time: 04:58. He had enough time for a three hour nap, then he’d have to get up and go to school. He set his alarm and drifted off to thoughts of Byleistr singing him songs when he had trouble sleeping, back when they were still kids.

Norns he missed Byleistr.


	15. Some dudes know all the right things to say

It had been a full week since Thor’d been kicked out, and he most certainly wasn’t still smiling about the fact that Loki would have had to spy on the room he was in and do undercover work to have not only found it but have come when nobody else was there. Besides, he hated the Jotnar right now anyways, right?

‘ _It wasn’t one of us_ ,’ Loki had said. In retrospect, he had seemed genuine, though Loki had never struck him as the trustworthy type. But that still didn’t eliminate the possibility of Loki just happening to be left out of the conversation regarding the attack.

Thor was banished, sure, but he wasn’t out of the loop. He made sure not to be. He inquired about the situation in Asgard _daily_ to his friends. Sif was the keenest to share information (despite promising that as soon as he was healed she’d beat the shit out of him for pulling such a stunt), she was still heartbroken about his banishment… or Fandral’s, but he didn’t want to air any suspicions of Fandral, Sif and Hogun being an item just yet. Besides, it was their business anyways.

Thor was on his guard. Laufey and Odin had had a meeting, Laufey had denied the attack and Odin had just _accepted it_! What a fool his father was! Now the Jotnar would think that they had the right to walk all over the Aesir!

Thor was still in crutches, but Angrboda’d be in a wheelchair for a week so he was thrilled. Svadilfari had quit the team, so they were fucked. Thor hadn’t been called into the dean’s office, because Odin had paid a lot of money to hush up the situation, so unless you were a Jotunn or an Asgardian, you did **_not_** know what had gone down that night. Yet still he could swear that he felt the dean's (Smith's) eyes on him.

Svadilfari and Fandral, in comparison to Angrboda and Thor, had come out relatively unscathed. If Thor was having one of those ‘let’s get real’ days, he’d question why that had come to be. Why did he and someone he barely know fight so hard to get the other killed while ignoring the other people in the fight? What **_possible_** common link did they have? Hmmm… good thing it wasn’t one of those ‘let’s get real’ days, or he might’ve confessed that the only thing that they had in common was a shared desired to be in Loki’s pants. Maybe he’d mention that one day and see if it got him punched or not.

Thor ran a hand through his hair absentmindedly as Sif and Hogun talked lawyer-y stuff. The only word Thor understood in their conversation was ‘lunch’, and he couldn’t agree more because he was **_starving_**.

The Jotnar were in the cafeteria too. As soon as people saw the Aesir coming, they filled up the seats around the Jotnar. Unofficially everyone _sort of_ knew what had happened, and they didn’t want it to happen in the cafeteria… with knives present. Sindr watched Thor warily, tucking a lock of flaming red hair in behind her head nervously as though she didn’t quite know how to act. Thor smiled her way and she returned it, reassured that her people were safe.

Thor grabbed his food and took his seat. He could feel Loki watching him. Now wasn’t that a pleasant twist? He grabbed the sausage from his hotdog and licked around the bottom before opening his mouth slightly and sucking the bottom bit in. He was deep-throating a sausage for Skuld’s sake, and not checking back to see if his intended audience was watching. Thor swallowed the whole thing down whole, didn’t even bite it or anything. He ought to check if they had bananas up in this joint.

Thor slurped up his soda extra loud, before getting up to grab another. Spoiler alert, they were somewhat close to the Jotnar’s table. He asked if anyone wanted another, and since everyone else on the table did, he enlisted Fandral’s help in carrying them, since he was incapable of carrying more than just his what with his left arm holding his crutch (he was doing it single-crutched instead of double, mostly because he was lazy, partly because he really was just in crutches to prevent intense pain from bursting through his foot at any given moment).

“It’s been a while since we got laid, you know?” Thor mentioned, somewhat loudly. Fandral, horn dog that he was, nodded along with him. 

“You’re right. Any ideas?”

“Cute redhead I’ve been thinking of railing. Have to wait a bit though, I don’t do high school kids even if it’s their last year.” He made up the story for no apparent reason. And why’d he say ‘high school’? What purpose did that bit of the lie have? Was it just a filler? Was it a hidden fantasy? He’d never know. He had no plans of finding out. His gaze didn’t go to Loki, but he knew the man was listening.

“Don't brag if you ain’t gonna share.”

“Not enough room in his arse for much more than my sausage, I’m afraid.” Some of this was cringe, but he knew he’d get a better opportunity later. Thor drank his soda at the station, knowing it would be hard to carry back with a crutch.

Only once Thor was back at his seat did he chance a glance at Loki. Loki, by chance, caught his eye too. Loki flushed before proceeding to glare at Thor. Well, if he wasn’t allowed to **_kill_** anyone, the least he could do was have a bit of harmless fun.

Mostly harmless, anyways.

.

Fandral was only _sort of_ living with Thor. His banishment was nearly as bad as Thor’s, his was more of two weeks probation (he was only Thor’s partner in the duel, he had not instigated it) then he’d be back home with his family. 

Till then though, they’d every intention of making the most of it.

“When d’you get out of that cast?” Fandral asked, walking over with two litre-full tankards of beer. They were Aesir. They drank when they were… er… they drank.

“Four more days.” Thor groaned.

“Can’t wait. We need you in fighting shape. We’re playing the West Dragons next month. We need our captain.”

“What’s so wrong with our co-captain?”

“He allegedly hates the stupid team and regrets that I- he cannot just kick them all off and play by himself.” Fandral snorted. Thor ruffled the man’s hair. “Anyways, how was your week?”

“ _Well…”_

_Monday:_

_“Still stalking me, huh? Even though I_ **_explicitly_ ** _told you to stay away.” Loki had rounded on Thor right as he was about to follow him (discretely) into his Orchestra practice._

_“Stalking? I was just trying to get to the toilets.” Thor huffed, feigning annoyance._

_“In_ **_this_ ** _part of the school? Right when you know I have Orchestra practice?”_

_“I was already in this part of school. I’m sorry, would you rather I go to the ones upstairs?” Thor waggled his crutches (he’d brought along both)._

_“Yes.” Loki deadpanned. He frowned and squinted a little. “I thought you only had one.”_

_“Mighty observant of you. I typically only use one, it makes carrying things easier, but no I have two.”_

_Loki rolled his eyes. “Figures. Go wave your pom-poms elsewhere.”_

_“I think I’d much rather be waving yours.” Thor winked at Loki before going off to the bathrooms._

_Tuesday:_

_When one thought about it, it really was_ **_Loki_ ** _who was at fault for presenting Thor with the challenge of not staying away. Loki ought to be locked up_ ~~ _, and Thor ought to get the keys_ _._ ~~

_How was Thor_ **_not_ ** _supposed to ‘accidentally’ trip into Loki while taking the stairs with his crutches instead of just using the damned elevator? No, Thor Odinson was an eco-friendly and health-conscious man with an ego the size of Manhattan. He wouldn’t be caught_ **_dead_ ** _taking the stairs. Besides, forget what the doctors said, his leg was basically healed._

_“Watch where you’re going!” Loki huffed, getting up. Then he realised who it was and scowled. “Oh, it’s you.”_

_He grabbed his things to quickly walk off, but not before Thor made a comment about how Loki’s father must’ve been a baker, because he had some nice buns._

_Wednesday:_

_On Wednesday, Thor’d taken a day off. Pursuing Loki was a full-time job, and Thor deserved some damn vacation time, dammit._

_Thursday:_

_Thor had cornered Loki outside of the younger male’s soccer practice. He hadn’t made it obvious, because_ **_Angrboda_ ** _was there too, but he’d decided to take a drink from the water fountain nearest to the field he was supposed to be watching Fandral direct the Rugby Team on._

_Angrboda was on crutches by now, and Loki was helping him around. Thor rolled his eyes. There was no way that Angrboda didn’t realise how big of a crush Loki had on him… come to think about it, while Angrboda had called_ **_him_ ** _a fag that first night, he didn’t seem to use that word too often. Hmmm… maybe he knew something about himself? Maybe he was bisexual too? Interesting._

_“What does he want?” Thor heard douchebag ask Loki._

_“No clue, ‘Boda. Ignore him, he’s a piece of trash.”_

_“Well then you must hate the environment, since you keep refusing to pick me up.” Thor said, winking at Loki. “What’s up hot stuff?” He winked, turned to Angrboda, nodded, “douche,” he acknowledged. He made his way out of there, hopping off on his crutches while Angrboda chased him on his own. “I have a bigger dick- I’d take you rough and hard, I’d be the best you ever had!” Thor shouted back to Loki, grateful that he had a week and a bit’s more practice on crutches than the douchebag who was chasing him._

_Friday:_

_“Stay away from me, Odinson.” Loki warned. Funny how each warning seemed less venomous._

_“Relax, Laufeyson, I’m not here to comment on how your eyes sparkle when you smile, or how good you look riding a bike, nor how much better you’d look on mine. Also not gonna say that you look good in leather or that I want to take you outside right now and do unspeakable things to you in front of everyone. What I_ **_will_ ** _say is that I’m here to sign up for the bake sale on behalf of the Aesir.”_

_“I thought they cast you out.”_

_“Meh, I still run the social scene.” Thor didn’t even bother asking Loki how he knew about it. He would have guessed that Jotunheimr must have_ **_some_ ** _sort of intelligence agency set up. Thor grabbed the pen from near Loki’s hand, their fingers momentarily brushing, it felt nice. It must have to Loki too, because he pretended not to notice for a moment before pulling his hand back as though Thor’s were a venomous snake about to strike at Loki. Thor wrote his name down, as well as that of the other Aesir, and dropped the pen._

_“Nice haircut by the way! Makes you look like Fenceton Beth!” Thor called, leaving like it was just another encounter, like Thor_ **_wasn’t_ ** _secretly fangirling over how soft and cold Loki’s hands were._

“It was alright.” Thor decided. “How about you?”

“Well…” Fandral thought to his week, and the threesome he’d had with Sif and Hogun. “Alright too, I guess. Now come on, let’s play some Mario Kart.”

.

Loki’s entire week had been one gigantic train-wreck by the name of Thor Odinson.

Here’s how **_his_** week went!

MONDAY, HOLY MONDAY!

Thor Odinson had been making the most inappropriate sounds in the lunchroom, and had even gone so far as to obscenely eat a hotdog- wHO DID THAT!? Loki’s boner had been a result of Sigyn touching his arm, horn-dog stud that he was, thankfully it went down before they had to leave. Odinson also making inappropriate comments about some poor guy Odinson was perving on, as well as talking about his endowment was **_not_** what Loki wanted to listen to as  he ~~waited for his boner to go down~~ ate his lunch.

MOTHERFUCKING TUESDAY!

The dumb, blond idiot had taken the stairs and naturally fallen over onto Loki. Loki had thought about getting in a kick, but reasoned that someone might walk in on him beating up a ‘cripple’ and hate him, not that he especially cared about his reputation. He wasn’t a total airhead, unlike the man who had just fallen atop him. 

“Watch where you’re going!” Loki had scowled. “Verdandi! You’re such a fucking train-wreck!” The School Fool had a dopey look on his face and Loki reckoned he probably didn’t remember Loki saying that bit.

And then the fucker had had the cheek- the _fucking cheek-_ to comment on Loki’s, well, bottom cheeks. Urgh, the thought alone was both infuriating and disgusting!

Loki breathed out the smoke from his cigarette. AND THEN THERE HAD BEEN WEDNESDAY!

Well, actually Thor hadn’t really done anything that day. But the point was that Loki had had to see the blond idiot that day and he was still mad about that.

THURSDAY! THOR-DAMNED-THOR’S-DAY!

OMG, Loki was just trying to be a _good friend_ , and hang out with his _good friend_ before practice, and that asshole had to make more of those disgusting gay comments in front of Angrboda! And poor Angrboda had then gone on to chase that fool. Loki liked to think that without the crutches, ‘Boda would have won. He’d get to test that theory out in a few weeks, he supposed.

AND THEN THERE WAS FRIDAY- AND OMG THAT WAS THE WORST!

Thor had brushed up against his hand, sending weird tingles of rage that were unlike anything Loki had ever experienced. It took him a moment to realise Thor’s hand was even _next_ to his own, honest!

That stupid hand. That fucking hand…

So what if it was warm? Sigyn had warm hands. ‘Boda’s hands were even warmer, which was funny because the rest of him was usually pretty cool. ‘Boda’s were also more calloused, rougher, because he was a real man. Because he built shit and he played the violin.

Thor played the guitar. Pssh. Who cared if he could play the riff from My Chem’s Save Yourself like a pro, or if he even _liked_ My Chem for that matter!? It seemed like a pretty common riff, the band had probably gotten it from somewhere, but My Chem was where Loki knew that he’d heard it. Thor probably didn’t even know it was in a My Chem song, the uncultured swine that he was. 

And besides, it really was just a hand! Just a brush! Two of Thor’s fingers had collided with the side of Loki’s hand and he’d taken a bit long to pull away.

No, wait, that was wrong!! He hadn’t! He’d pulled away as soon as he’d realise! He wasn’t some fucking fag like his brother. 

And even if he was, he wasn’t stupid enough to _indulge_ in the homosexual arts! He wasn’t some dumb idiot, a slave to his own desires! He had Sigyn, he was good and safe. Period. No need to take a cock up his arse or however the homosexuals did it. That was where he and Byleistr were splintered, Loki had discipline, Loki could keep it in his damned pants. His idiot brother couldn’t, and that’s why he was no longer Jotunn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to 😂 I don't even need to quote the bit, you know which part it is, and yes I most certainly, absolutely, DEFINITELY had to 😂I think that it was about here where the fic devolved from a serious one about cultural constraints and the negative impact they can have on people into one that's more of a crack fic. 
> 
> Anyways, you got this far. I suppose it's too late to jump ship ;)


	16. When it comes down to it it’s all just game

IMPORTANT! Loki hadn’t wanted to go to the club that last time, and he hadn’t volunteered it this time either.

His fucking crackhead friends. Honestly, he ought to drop the lot of them. Except ‘Boda, he didn’t do that much crack. Urgh, and he just **_knew_** they’d be making him drive them home, dammit.

Sigyn had had a little too much it seemed. She was all loopy and floppy and giggly and she kept touching him inappropriately. Then there was ‘Boda who was practically having sex with Skadi on the dance floor. Disgusting. 

“Baby, dance with me!” Sigyn pouted. How was Loki supposed to when as soon as he would take her out she’d lay her head on his arm and go floppy and drool?

After a few glasses of water, Sigyn was a bit better off. Loki doubted it was the water though, probably just the fact that it’d taken two hours to get that much water in her in the first place.

Loki lead Sigyn to the dance floor, spinning her around a bit, hoping a little that if she just threw up or something they could go home. Or maybe she could sweat out the cocaine? Did cocaine even work like that? Hell if Loki knew, he’d never tried more than a few crystals once at a party. He wasn’t a frequent user like his friends.

.

Well **_obviously_** now that Thor was banished from Asgard he and his friends had to meet at Heven.

“Isn’t that that guy you were drooling over last week?” His sister pointed towards Loki dancing awkwardly with his friends who were all clearly drugged up.

“You guys need to stop selling coke here.”

“You run your business, I’ll run mine.” She smiled through gritted teeth, he put his hands up in peace and backed up.

“Thanks for the drinks, sis!”

“Anytime, you knob!”

He watched Loki fumble around the dance-floor with a giggling Sigyn. Loki looked so uncomfortable, poor lamb. She kept slipping her hands down from his shoulders, and he kept shying away ever so slightly. Did Loki even realise he did that, or was it an instinct? Did other people realise he did that, or was it just something Thor had picked up on from all the Loki-watching he did?

“Thor, I need to have a word with you,” Sif hissed, bringing him close. “Thor, lately I notice you’ve been spending a- Thor? **_Thor!?_** **_THOR ODINSON!_ ** ”

Loki had, by happenstance, been dancing somewhat near them, and Thor had given a laugh. Loki had snapped his head towards him, that damned ego surfacing once more. “What’s so funny, Odinson?”

Thor had moved slightly away from Sif, cue the disgruntled shouting of his name. “Just your dancing.”

Sigyn snorted- for once, not cocaine! “He’s a great dancer.”

“Not from what I just saw- none of you are. You all need lessons.”

“What? From **_you?_** ” She sneered. Loki could see where this was going, from the look in his eyes, and he was not liking it.

“At least **_I_** know the basics.” Sigyn rolled her eyes at the clown of an Aesir she was dealing with. Loki was just glad she’d stopped talking. “Which is more than I could say for any of you.”

“Alright then, Mr. Hotshot. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

“I’d need a partner.” Sigyn recoiled. She wanted nothing to do with the blond, god-like hunk. 

“Loki, you do it.”

“What?” Loki asked, face white like paper.

“Go on. Show him up. For me?” She pouted. Loki still clearly didn’t want to do it, so she said, “I’ll sleep with you tonight.” He still didn’t want to do it. “Please, baby? Think about how stupid he’ll look! You’ve got all the-the _skill-z_.”

“Alright, fine.” He snapped. Anything to get her to shut up. His mood was hot-and-cold when it came to her lately, he didn’t like it. He didn’t know what had prompted it. Probably all the stress from bloody Odinson.

Sigyn didn’t seem to notice his tone, and smiled mockingly at Thor. “Go ahead, show me what you’ve got.”

“Gladly.” Thor pulled a stubborn, cursing Loki towards him.

“What are you fucking doing?” Loki hissed.

“Teaching you how to dance.” Thor said, as though it were obvious.

“ ** _Why_** are you fucking doing?” It wasn’t grammatically correct, but it ought to have gotten the message across to Ducking Odinson.

Thor shrugged. “I saw a damsel in distress, and came to save her from you. Seriously, your dancing should be criminalised. They should lock you up and throw away the key. You’re so lucky that I’m here to help you.” Thor was teasing, obviously, but had no real way of knowing if Loki was getting that it was a joke. The vampiric boy’s reddening face said: nope.

“Whatever- _I’m not gay!”_

“You should’ve said that back when we were still with your girlfriend. And relax, will you? I dance with Sif all the time, and she’s dating my best friends.”

“Friend _s_?”

“Irrelevant.” Thor brushed up over his Freudian slip with ease. Besides, it wasn’t like Loki knew their names, Sif was in no danger of an outing or something. “And what do you have against homosexuals anyways? Gay kid steal your lunch money when you were a kid?”

“They’re unnatural.”

“There’re hundreds of species that engage in same-sex behaviour.” Thor whirled Loki around.

“There’re also hundreds of species that eat their own shit.”

“I’m not so convinced that you don’t.” Thor rolled his eyes. 

“Homosexuality’s just some new form of social decimation invented by SJWs to bring about the downfall of the West. Fags can’t fight, everyone knows that.”

“Homosexuality’s not new- the Greeks had it!”

“And what happened to them? Exactly.”

“Lots of cultures had it.”

“I’m **_Norse_**. A real man. We have special words for fags: ergi, argr, earg, you name it.”

“I’m Norse too. And like all cultures, ours had flaws.”

Loki snorted. “I’m afraid that I see no flaws.” The music changed, it was something a bit more country-pop.

Thor huffed. “You speak like your father.”

“He’s a great man.”

“He’s a coward. And so are you.” Loki was looking ticked off. He moved to leave but Thor grabbed his wrist, dragging Loki back to him and swinging him under Thor’s legs, picking him up on the other side in a dizzying move and spinning him around like a sprinkler head. Loki fell onto Thor, dizzy, hating every second of Thor’s  ~~warm, comforting~~ presence ~~, and his rock-hard chest and biceps ~~ as he grabbed onto Thor’s arms for purchase, his legs still shaking a little. “Come on now, I thought you said you were a good dancer. **_And_** a Norseman! That was nothing.” Thor chortled.

“Agreed. You swing like a little girl.” Loki bit back.

“Really?” Thor swung Loki out before bringing him back quickly, grabbing him by the waist, and lifting him over his head. Loki looked freaked out when he landed. Awww, did the little baby have acrophobia? Poor Lamb. Daddy Wolf would make it all better. “How was that?” He asked, holding Loki almost flush to him. Remembering himself, Loki pulled back.

Loki moved away and walked back over to his friends, still having had not answered Thor’s question. He was met with a sleeping ‘Boda, Sigyn, and Skadi, a missing Logi and Svad (they’d been flirting with two girls earlier, and had probably gone home with them), and a still-snorting ‘Saxa. 

“Thor.” He heard Sif’s voice behind him. “Thor. We need to talk.”

.

Two men dressed in jeans and tees and Nemean Leather and shades strode into Jotunheimr. They went to Mimir’s old flat, which was being rented out by a young Jotunn couple.

“Alright.” Ratkeith said, taking out his canister of sleeping gas. “We’re just gonna go in there and spray the place, knock ‘em out. Glybja’s manning the getaway vehicle, and Brutus and Godfrey’re gonna make it known that ‘Aesir’ were here.”

Alexei nodded. He had the duct-tape and ropes to load the people into the vehicle. Angrboda (unisex name, apparently) and Loptr weren’t coming back to their apartment. Alexei felt bad knowing this. But it had to be done. He’d grown up in Svartalfheim, it was torture, they needed the money stat.

They broke in, abducted the couple, and raced away. Leaving only a few fibres of the signature denim that they were wearing behind.

Aesir denim. **_Royal_** Aesir denim. Collected during rugby practice from one Mr. Thor Odinson’s own jeans, with the help of a knife and a lock-pick.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep freaking out about the strikethroughs because I use Pages and I guess it's a different code function to add them on there vs adding them on here, unlike with Word.  
> If something at any point in this story makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE (not including Thor's success in procuring Loki, of course), don't hesitate to call it out! It was probably meant to have a strikethrough.


	17. Instead of talking, let me demonstrate, yeah

“Thor, what’s going on with you and the Jotunn? Loki, I mean?” Sif hissed as the barista walked away after having had brought their coffees.

“Well, he’s still having trouble accepting his homosexuality, and I’m trying to help him.”

“By **_harassing him_**!?” Sif had her hands pulling away at her otherwise neat hair in frustration. “Thor, I get it, he’s gay- non-politically-correctly-speaking: there’s _no denying that-_ and it’s unhealthy the way he’s living. I’ve heard some Jotnar get cast out completely for being gay, and for the women they sometimes-” she shuddered, clenching her fists. Rape was disgusting. Rape with the hopes of converting your kid’s sexuality was even more disgusting. It happened to boys too, of course, but all she could think about was some poor girl lying there and having her legs ripped open as she fought an attacker and how scary it must be when he- she tightened her lips and tears streamed down her face as she looked at Thor. “He might get some leeway- he’s the leader’s son, and it’s obvious he isn’t welcoming your advances, at least not outwardly. Thor, you need to **_watch yourself_**!” She warned, getting crosser by the second, not necessarily with Thor, but just with the way some people got treated in the world. It was always a sucker-punch to be reminded that what you had was what the top 10% had, and that everything below was a shit-show. 

Thor nodded. “Alright, Sif. I am sorry that this has all made you so uncomfortable.”

She shook her head. “I don’t mean to be violent or rude, sorry, it’s just… you know, it’s not just you who would have to deal with potential repercussions. What if he snaps one day and kisses you and, I don’t know, they stone him to death for it or something.”

“Stoning?”

She waved her hands. “I don’t know how barbarians think, Thor! And do you really think that you’re convincing him that embracing a part of him he’s been scared of is going to work if you’re always antagonising him? Are you really helping him by doing that?”

“No, Sif.” Thor felt guilty. “I’ll apologise to him. Properly. With words. And an ‘I’m sorry’. And nothing more.”

“Good, thank you.” Sif sighed in relief.

.

'Harrowing' was the only word to describe it. How else did one describe a video of two Jotnar being beheaded by two Aesir, after being forced to read their last rites off of some whiteboard in the back and being forced to call themselves ‘scum’ and ‘inferior’ for being Jotunn? Even some of the Aesir who had gotten to watch the video before law enforcement took it down had vomited.

Tensions had never been this tight. The last gang-war to break out had been in Thor’s father’s time, first amongst the Aesir and Vanir (resolved by Odin and Vé both taking Vanir brides) and then continued by further restlessness in the region resulting in Jotunheim and Muspelheim heading to war. In truth, if The Cold War hadn’t been happening around that time, the fighting likely would have escalated.

And, naturally, by The Cold War, Thor was not referring to Russia v. USA, oh no, no, no. He was referring to the series of proxy wars being launched against the Jotnar by Asgard. It had been a messy and sloppy struggle. Peace had only been achieved a year into Thor’s own life. His father, they said, had prayed to the Old Gods for wisdom, and had sacrificed his eye to the Great God Odin, for whom his father was named. They said that that was what had ended the war, his father’s newfound wisdom (and Laufey’s depleted resources too, obviously).

Thor had, after the video, not even looked in Loki’s direction- except for the one time to express guilt over the whole thing. Which was pretty fucking odd because he had no idea who’d done it. He’d asked Sif if she knew, asked _Baldr_ , both leads had turned up empty. This was so weird.

Now naturally with all the rumours afloat that there might be a new Gang War, everyone was out and about picking sides. The Vanir sided with the Aesir because **_duh_** , obviously. The Ljósálfar were undecided, but there was growing speculation that they’d side with the Jotnar- apparently Loki and Bentley were fast friends, both with a love for Shakespeare… that had to be the one time Shakespeare had ever been useful in the real world, **_ever_** \- despite that when it came to the still-heads of each gang, Aelsa and Odin were far closer than Laufey and Aelsa. The Fire Giants were **_obviously_** siding with the Aesir. The Dwarves too. The vagabonds that made up Niffleheim would likely support the Jotnar. The only weird gang was Svartalfheim, who from all accounts seemed to want nothing to do with the war. Oh well, nobody was really judging them too much over it. They were a poor peoples.

Thor remembered the one and only time that he’d ventured into then land: it had been December, he was 8, he’d watched a man and a rat fighting over a slice of bread in the snow. It had been hard to distinguish which was which. The buildings were, in general, a grey-green-barf-like colour. There were some tall buildings, but most were unfinished, scrapped due to budgeting cuts. Most of the buildings were a storey-or-two tall. He thinks he remembered a total of _one_ mall, maybe, in the area. It wasn’t really a mall, more like a shopping centre. Was it fair to call a cluster of about five stores a mall? He wasn’t sure.

Anyways, the point was that there was no great loss in not having the Dark Elves on your side. What were they good for anyways? Cannon fodder? Thor snorted at his own joke.

About three days after the attack, it was Loki who had solicited him. “Do you know what happened- who did it?” Loki asked, eyes flitting from left to right, clearly on high-alert. Thor shook his head.

“I’m out of the loop, remember?”

“Surely Sif or your brother must have told you something!” Damn, Loki even knew the only two people he’d dared to ask. Was he stalking Loki or was it the other way around?

Thor shook his head once more. “No, I’m afraid. I asked but they’ve no clue. They said that they hadn’t heard anybody talking about. Loki, I’m sorry about what happened, but I don’t think we did it. And if we did, pshhh… I don’t know, maybe it’s not _one of us_. Maybe if someone who was one of us _did_ do it they’re no longer a part of the gang. Nobody from that night, to my knowledge, was unaccounted for.”

Loki shook his head. “Angrboda and Loptr named _Aesir_ as their attackers.”

“Well we think the Jotnar killed Mjoll Mjollson, but you deny that.” Loki’s face turned bitter.

“Are you saying that this is _revenge!?_

“I’m saying that clearly neither of us can be expected to know everything our respective gang-mates do, Loki.” Thor said, hotly. He sighed, and held his hands up in peace. “Look, we both have Intelligence Committees in our gangs. They **_must_** know more about this than we do, right?”

“Right, so we should ask them?” Thor deadpanned him. “Oh right, you can’t… it’ll be hard to get around my father to ask. He’s a control-freak, and if he orchestrated the attack against that Mjoll of yours, he’ll definitely be guarding them-” he cut himself off. Why was he speaking so much to Dumbass Odinson anyways?

“I get it.” Thor had met Laufey on a few occasions. He did not like the man, and was willing to believe the feeling was mutual. Laufey’s homophobia had ruined his son’s life, so he hardly believed that he’d be accepting of a bisexual man- heck, some _gay_ men weren’t accepting of bisexual ones. “Look, uh… I’m sorry about the other night in the club. Won’t happen again. Especially now, with everything that’s going on, it’s best we keep some distance.” It was an awkward thing to say in that moment, but in truth Thor didn’t know how else to get it out. Thor didn’t know if he’d even get another chance to get it out, and he’d already made his promise to Sif.

Loki looked at him in an odd way, part of his face showing some relief that he was also very clearly trying to hide. Pokerface was a commonality amongst members of gangs. If you didn’t have one, you tended to get shot early on.

“Good. I thought I’d have to threaten you.”

“No need.” Thor held his hands up once more in peace. They weren’t friends, no. But there was no reason to create an enemy of an acquaintance. Not yet at least.

.

Here’s the thing that not many people realise about star athletes: training doesn’t necessary mean going out and playing your sport, it often entails working out the areas associated with your sport. Maintaining a healthy body is vital for all sports- even chess to a degree!

Now that Angrboda was back to normal, he and Loki had resumed their gym sessions.

“Can you spot me?” The gloriously sweaty, god-like man asked Loki.

“Sure.” Loki stood near his head as Angrboda laid back to lift a barbell with 50kg weights attached to either end. His best-friend was strong. Loki hoped he’d be of **_some_** help if this all went wrong.

He watched the way ‘Boda’s chest relaxed and compressed as he lifted and brought down said weights, over and over, 30 reps. He put the barbell down on the rack, heaving it out as he caught his breath. Loki thought his good friend had gone too hard and too fast, and new that ‘Boda would probably wake up the next day unable to bend his arms. ‘Boda’s head was awfully close to Loki’s crotch, Loki realised, cursing himself for making the discovery. He could already feel himself start to stiffen. He wondered if ‘Boda noticed it too. 

~~ So maybe those ‘past-feelings’ weren’t so in-the-past. **_Fine_**! Fine, there, he said it! But who could deny that Angrboda was a fine specimen? He was handsome, muscular, smart, funny- could one really blame Loki’s cock for being interested, even if it was **_totally_** in a platonic, ‘bro’ kind of way? ~~

He inched slightly away, and then ‘Boda stopped lying there and also moved away. Had he noticed or not!?

“Your turn. What are you doing?”

“Sit-ups.”

“Perfect.” Loki laid down and Angrboda stood on his feet to anchor him. Loki started doing his sit-ups. Angrboda got bored and started looking down at Loki. It might’ve been Loki’s imagination, but he thought he might have spied ‘Boda looking down his shorts.  ~~ _Norns did that turn him on._ ~~ That was such a weird thought, ‘Boda would never!  ~~ His dick gave a small twitch regardless. He imagined ‘Boda, over him, pinning him down with those powerful arms of his and sucking on Loki’s cock, not letting him get away. It would be so nice to just give up control like that, give up his will, be someone else’s responsibility for a change. ~~

Loki cursed that he was in the middle of a session, **_with_** ‘Boda present. Usually when his thoughts drifted to lewder materials, he bit down on his wrist. In fact, if one were to check at that instant where Angrboda was **_undeniably_** looking down a flustered Loki’s pants- wanting to palm his cock until he came-, they would find the remnants of several pairs of bite-marks along Loki’s wrist, all still in the process of healing. It was an effective method.

Loki finished his hundred reps and got up, sweating. He took the towel and bottle that ‘Boda handed him. ‘Boda was such a good friend. ‘Boda wanted to do some sit-ups too. Loki was tired, so he got onto the ground to hold Angrboda’s legs. Angrboda did his hundred too, coming up on the last one and hugging his knees in exhaustion. He looked at Loki, who handed him a bottle of water. He took it appreciatively, noticing that Loki’s wrist had a new set.

“I think that’s enough.” Angrboda said. “I’m knackered. What about you?”

“Dead. On the inside and out.”

“Fab.” Angrboda stood up and helped Loki up too. They both went to go and take a shower. Angrboda towelled himself off and headed to the changing area. He didn’t like changing in the shower area, he was scared of slipping. And the more he’d brought it up, the more afraid Loki’d become of it too. They really ought to add in adhesive strips to the shower floor tiles in there.

Angrboda kept his eyes respectfully on his own clothes. In the past he’d chanced a glance or two at Loki: who wouldn’t? It was **_Loki_**! He went over to where he’d ditched his shirt and bumped into a half-naked Loki. Loki looked at him startled, his face kissing-distance away, they both froze.

_It would have been so easy then and there to just pin him down and take him. He knew Loki liked him too, he was no fool._ _It wasn’t like either of them would tell._ But Angrboda also happened to be one of the few people privy to what had happened to Byleistr. And while he knew he would have no problems being Loki’s ruin, he wouldn’t want to be the reason that _other people_ ruined Loki. No, what they had, their friendship, it was fine. He still had Loki. Wasn’t that all that mattered? He’d heard of Multiple Worlds and how it was like having a timeline parallel to yours in which just one thing was changed. Maybe in one of those timelines they didn’t live with _‘gang_ ’ written into their blood, spelled out. But there was a time and place for everything, and hedonism was never a virtue.

Angrboda smiled and took his shirt, popping it over his head and grabbing his jacket. Loki pulled on his shoes. They were out of there lickety-split. 

.

Loki was so confused. Had he almost kissed ‘Boda? Had ‘Boda almost kissed **_him_**!? What was going on!? This was so confusing!! 

Add to that the fact that people were too preoccupied with the potential Gang War about to break out, and Loki felt truly lost, alone, and hopeless.

His mind flashed helplessly back towards **_other_** situations. _‘Boda and Loki choosing the same spot for Hide n’ Seek when they were kids; ‘Boda and Svad masturbating at a sleepover, and Loki joining them so he could explain away his erection; Svad full-on picking Loki up and moving him out of the way during a fight and Loki getting a hard-on; ‘Boda’s smile; the feel of ‘Boda’s hands; that one time ‘Boda winked at him…_ _~~the way he felt whenever Thor flirted with him. The real way, not the one he forced himself through mentally.~~ _ Grr, what was happening to him!?

It was out of necessity, truly, that a confused and agitated Loki Laufeyson found himself on Thor’s apartment doorstep at midnight. The area was like one of those low-budget apartment complexes that kind of looked like roadside motels. Loki pressed the bell, then waited a bit. He didn’t know if the bell was working, so he knocked on the door. Then again loudly.

He heard grumbling and heavy footsteps. So Thor then. Thor opened the door. “Fandral! Stop forgetting your-” his eyes widened upon discovering that the person in the doorframe was most definitely **_not_** Fandral! Thor popped his head out, looked left then right, and grabbed Loki by the collar, pulling him in and slamming the door shut behind them. “Are you crazy!?” Thor whisper-screamed, terrified at the prospect of somebody hearing them.

“How so?” Loki asked, surprisingly put-together for somebody who’d just been _yanked_.

“These are _Aesir_ apartments!”

“This is Midgard.”

“This is the **_border_**! And not all Aesir live in Midgard!” That was somewhat true. He didn’t actually know any other Aesir that may have inhabited these apartments, but it was always wise to err on the side of caution. People in this country talked, and Thor never knew where his father may have spies. If Odin were to comment on the meeting of his and Laufey’s son at a location as clandestine as, say, Thor’s apartment at midnight, Loki would be toast.

Loki shook his head and held out his hands peacefully. “I’m not here to fight.”

“Then what are you here for?” Thor asked, sceptically.

“I need to, uh, talk.”

“Talk about what?”

“Uh…” Exactly. Talk about _what_? Loki bit his lip nervously, he hadn’t thought this far ahead, which wasn’t something he commonly did. He’d gotten a full-ride to MU, despite his dad being loaded, for his cunning and wit. They’d thought he’d make a fantastic lawyer- he **_would_** be a fantastic lawyer, but for now his words were failing him, and it was just downright embarrassing. “I don’t know.”

Thor looked annoyed, but a second later his expression flipped. Loki could only throw guesses as to why, opening his mouth on the matter was certain to result in even more humiliation. “Well, I’m assuming that this is the last place you’d come willingly. Is it about gang stuff? Did you learn something new?” Thor looked at Loki like he was an encyclopedia. _Well, he had learned_ ** _something_** _new. But was it really something new, or something he’d always sort of known?_

“Uhh…” Loki stammered, not quite able to string words together.

“Oh.” Thor blinked. “Uhm. Would you like to sit down, maybe?”

“No, no. Actually this was, uhm, stupid, really.”

“What was?”

“Uh.” Loki shook his head. “It’s unimportant.”

“Well, if you’re sure.” Thor said, after a long and lengthy pause.

“Er, yeah. Thanks.” Loki turned around.

“I’ll see you out.” Thor followed him to the door.

“Thanks.” Loki paused for a moment in the doorframe. His eyes flitted as he made a split-second decision. He ducked his head inside and kissed Thor square on the lips **_very_** briefly. Before Thor could move (and anyone reading this surely realises that he would have grabbed Loki and kissed him hard and made love to his mouth with his own tongue), Loki had gone and disappeared into the night’s slowly steadying breeze. Blinking as he snapped out of it, Thor cursed Loki’s name half-heartedly, before locking the door and crawling back into his own room, settling under the covers.

And going the hell back to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We don't delve into Loki's mind too often, but I had hoped that there might have been some language in previous chapters that would have implied that Loki's lying to himself when he says he's 'straight'.


	18. Get down to business and skip foreplay

The bake sale was on. Here’s how it worked, just incase you didn’t know, which would be ridiculous because it happened **_every year_**.

Competing stalls would fight to sell the most cakes for charity. The winner got a floating trophy. It **_shouldn’t_** have mattered so much to a country full of thugs and bandits, but it did for some reason. Probably just the opportunity to crush the other gangs and make them feel inferior.

The Vanir won it **_every fucking year_** because they were skilled bakers. But this year was Baldr’s first year at MU, and the boy was a god in the kitchen. While Thor had been forbidden from setting foot in Asgard, he’d been allowed to participate and even lead in this competition. It was that important. 

Skadi, for all her general lack of worth, was also a pretty exceptional baker. But she was nothing in comparison to Sigyn (there was a reason Loki called her ‘Cinnamon Bun’ and it wasn’t because she had cinnamon buns) or even Drrf, who’d had to cook for himself since he was a babe because his parents were always too drunk to help out. Heck, even ‘Saxa was a decent baker! His forte was donuts. The point was that they had a pretty solid team, especially with Loki and Angrboda on advertising. Something about the two of them just made all the ladies go ‘yeah, sure’.

Asgard had sold 532 cupcakes so far and 30 slices of cake. Sales and money were monitored by an independent party: the school mathematics club. There was a whole set of procedures to make sure nobody cheated (in the past, Jotnar used to put their own money into their cash-pile, and Aesir used to throw away half their cakes and pretend they were sold). Jotunheim had 70 cupcakes and 42 whole cakes sold. They were only 47 copper pieces under Asgard. Vanaheim, it seemed, were keen on losing this year, going so far as to call it ‘unfair’ that Asgard’s team had ‘so many Vanir’ on it, and mentioning that Angrboda and Thor should have been advertising for Vanaheim since they were both half-Vanir. Thor had not known that Angrboda was half Vanir. He did not _like_ sharing, well, **_anything_** , with the other male,

But seriously, lol, imagine going from first place to third even with the frigging Vésons on your team! Thor’s cousins low-key looked like gods. Heck, no, if you had Freyr seducing moms into buying your food, and you were still losing, it was all your fault. Why did all of Thor’s uncles work for Vanaheim? Well, except Cul, but nobody ever really talked about Uncle Cul. It tended to bring about bad luck.

“Oh wow, it’s so hot.” Thor pretended to fan himself, before taking off his shirt and revealing a wife beater underneath. He then grabbed two trays of cupcakes and marched out into the crowd. All 36 sold within minutes. Thor took back the 72 copper pieces to their accountant, who tried not to drool as she accepted it. He’d let them touch him and charge for it, but he had a feeling that that wouldn’t be allowed to count towards their total. Stupid no-prostitution charity fundraiser. Who cared about ‘family friendly’ when you had Thor fricking Odinson!?

“Thor! We’re out of coconut squares!” His brother called.

“Sure, I’ll get ‘em!” Thor marched out through the crowd, grabbing some brownies and selling them on the way. Guess that old saying was right: sex really did sell. That was a full 100 copper pieces earned- aka a silver piece.

Thor walked in through the school halls to the Asgard supply closet. He saw Loki there and instantly blushed and looked away before reminding himself that he was a grown-ass man and that confronting Loki over what had happened the previous night wasn’t going to bring about Ragnarok for Verdandi’s sake! So what if Loki had kissed him, no big deal. And the little lamb must be terrified of Thor right now anyways. Thor smiled and gave Loki an awkward wave, but Loki just stared impassively at him like nothing had happened.

Thor rolled his eyes at the other male’s behaviour. It was so obvious that he was just doing that because he regretted what he’d done the night prior. Thor remembered the soft peck he’d been delivered. It wasn’t even really all that sexual, that was a bit hard to pull-off with such a brief kiss, but it had definitely not been Thor’s worst kiss. Oh no. That had been with Ash Daniels, back when the boy still had braces, a full 8 years ago. Whatever. Thor grabbed the coconut squares and headed back, selling all of them before he hit the stand… which naturally meant he had to go back for more. Twice.

“Thor, we need some more ice-cream for the brownies.” Sif called. Seriously, why even have all this eye-candy if you weren’t gonna use it? He dropped off the 397 copper pieces with their accountant and grabbed a plate of cupcakes. Honestly, his group was **_so lucky_** they had him and his hot bod.

.

“What? Do you live here now?” Loki asked, irritated, carrying five boxes of what appeared to be a mix of cupcakes, scones, cakes, and biscuits.

“You of all people know that I don’t.” Thor said, in a tone that he didn’t quite mean, but whoops! Anyways, he hoped it hadn’t been too harsh.

“I see you’ve taken the ‘sex sells’ approach.” Loki eyed Thor up and down.

“Don’t you guys have a clause that says that if someone spends more than 30 copper pieces they get to kiss Svadilfari?” Thor deadpanned. It was pointless bringing up the kiss when it was clear that Loki didn’t want to talk about it. He thought back to what Sif had said about how he shouldn’t push too hard, and he agreed with her, but it didn’t mean that he got to just be pushed hard and disregarded then too.

“It’s working. We’re at 19 gold pieces.”

“We’re at 18.8.” Thor added what the accountant had had and the money from the cupcakes he’d just sold.”

“Have fun losing.” Loki smirked, walking out. Thor was starting to think that Loki’s brain was like a bag of cats. First he hated him, then he wanted Thor to stay away from him, then he came to his hospital room, then it was ‘stay away’ again, then it was ‘ **we** need to talk about our gang stuff, despite that I’m not heir and you’re _banished_ ’, then it was kissing Thor, and now it was just cocky talk? What?

Loki was in denial, Thor reasoned, trying to hide a smirk. Oh, he _knew_ the kid liked him! He walked back to the stall with a swing in his step.

“Apparently the Jotnar are 20 silver pieces ahead of us.” Thor told Sif. She frowned.

“We cannot let that stand.” She grabbed Thor’s wife beater and ripped it off of him so he was bare-chested. “Maybe you could go out and let people lick frosting off of you for money?”

“Sif! There are **_children_** here!” He hissed, ignoring the twitching in his pants. That honestly sounded like such a hot idea. _Focus, Thor,_ ** _focus_**.

“Offer to wash their cars if they spend a silver piece. For a _month_!” Sif begged, desperate.

“Hey guys- Thor, did Sif shark you too?” A shirtless Fandral asked wryly, coming in with a shirtless Hogun. That was not why Thor would have assumed she had ripped the other two’s shirts off, but he kept that to himself.

“Yeah- and guys, this is a _family_ fun day! We can’t walk around naked! It sets a bad example for the kids!”

“Alright, alright. Quit your yapping.” Fandral tossed Thor his initial shirt. “Just wear this… and get it wet. Sex sells.”

Like Thor hadn’t learnt that by now. Who did Fandral think had been selling all their stock?

Four hours later and it was over.

.

“Son of a bitch.” Thor cursed, shoving the last chair from their booth into the stock-room. As head of the team, he’d been in charge of putting all the school’s stuff away while the others had collected all the boxes and utensils and had left.

Asgard had lost. Jotunheim had lost. _Vanaheim had won!_ **_HOW!?_** He heard cursing and muttering. Someone must be coming into the stock-room. It was Loki, who was struggling along with a table.

“Here, let me help.” Thor went forward to grab the other end. 

“Thanks.” Loki said, crisply.

“Your friends didn’t help?”

“They’re still mending somewhat. Remember?” Loki rolled his eyes at Thor, making eye-contact for the first time that day.

“Aye… so we’re not going to talk about the kiss you gave me?”

“What kiss.” Loki rolled his eyes. Jaw tightening, as though he were daring Thor to talk about it.

“The kiss. On my mouth. Last night. When you were at my apartment.” Thor mentioned attempting casualness, while also being physically unable to speak in anything more than clipped sentences.

“I was half-asleep, just leant forward a bit. We’re the same height, almost.” Loki pointed out.

“Then why did you run away so quick after?”

“Uh, because it was late and I wanted to go home? You said yourself, that those were Aesir apartments.” Loki moved to flip the table so that he could push in the legs and pile it on the side of the wall. Thor helped.

“So that kiss had nothing to do with how jittery you were? Nothing with what caused that?” They put the table on the side of the wall.

“Haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”

‘If it was- if it was something… you know… if you were confused about something,’ **_that_** should have been Thor’s train of thought. But you know what. He wasn’t having a fucking good day. And it hadn’t started all that great either _what with Loki kissing him then dipping_! As previously stated, Thor’s interest with Loki wasn’t about some ‘taboo-closeted aspect’ or something, because that was one **_heck_** of a turn-off! He’d been the test-thing for men before, not that he’d ever admit it because **_hello_** , he was a sex-symbol, but it was just really fucking annoying and he wasn’t having it. 

Instead, what Thor said was. “Oh, you know, whatever it was that had you quaking in your boots last night, where you were too afraid to talk despite waking me up in the middle of the night and ruining my sleep.” Did he sound bitter? The better question, he supposed, was whether or not he cared about sounding bitter at this point.

Loki rolled his eyes. “Well, that was an ill-thought-out mistake and won’t happen ever again.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

So, like, _of course_ they wound up kissing.Thor wasn’t even entirely certain how they wound up kissing. Something about Thor being a ‘fucking arse’ and Loki being an ‘absolute cunt’ or whatever.

The point was that they were kissing. In a closet. And some very, **_very_** unresolved sexual tension was about to be very, **_very_** resolved.

To be fair to Thor, he did go down slowly, and he also made sure that Loki wasn’t the one pressed up against the wall. Lustful he may be, rapist he was not. This was new and unexplored territory for Loki, and heeding Sif’s ever so wise words, he didn’t want to ‘push it’.

Loki didn’t show any signs of discomfort as Thor unzipped his trousers. He even fumbled for the zip on Thor’s own, but naturally didn’t know how to open it from that angle. Okay, maybe the virgin-kink wasn’t **_entirely_** unappealing. Thor thought it was kind of cute. He grabbed Loki’s hands and tossed them aside, before unzipping his own dick.

“How do-” Thor shut Loki up with a kiss and grabbed both of their dicks in one big, burly hand. Loki’s knees were jelly, but the stronger other male supported him somewhat by cupping his back with his hands.

He stroked them both, thrusting into his own grip, Loki doing the same, but shyer. So cute. Loki came first, Thor released him, tugged on his own a bit, and came too.

“What was that?” Thor asked, zipping himself back up.

“I don’t know.” Loki shook his head. “We can’t do that again.”

“Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pssh. Like they have a choice 😂


	19. Just leave with me now, say the word and we’ll go (we can go)

So _of course_ they did it again, but the important part was that it only sometimes happened in closets!

Loki, of course, knew how to sneak out to Thor’s, and Thor… well, he was good at finding unoccupied closets. (Loki had snorted once while pondering this seemingly trivial factoid. It made sense that Thor would be good at this, wasn’t he a notorious playboy or something?)

The most important thing was that it was purely physical. Nothing gay about mutual masturbation, so long as you weren’t in a relationship with the person. It was just pleasure, really.

Loki got home from ‘The Joint’- where him and his friends and enemies congregated to play pool and drink- thanks to Angrboda and that motorbike of his.

“Brother.” Helblindi greeted.

“‘Blindi?” Loki blinked up at his older brother. “I haven’t seen you in days. I thought you’d died in your room or something.”

Helblindi shook his head. “Things’ve been busy with the Aesir situation.” They were walking towards the sitting room. Not the big, formal one. Rather the private, family one. The one upstairs in the centre of all of their rooms. 

“Do you have any intel on what went down?”

“No. There were some fibres found at the scene, and we’re having them analysed. Also a thin strand of hair that the kidnappers had left.”

“Good. The sooner we put the Aesir bastard who did this in the ground, the better.”

“Indeed.” There was something in Helblindi’s tone that was unsettling. Loki was never one to leave well enough alone.

“Brother.” And now Helblindi’s voice turned into a low, dark, whisper. Helblindi licked his lips, unsure of how to broach this subject. “There have been some… rumours.”

“About the killers?” Loki frowned.

“No. About **_you_**.” What? Loki kept his eyes curious, but in his mind they had just popped wide open. Oh no. Oh no. _Fuck, fuck, fuck!_

“What? Is this about the bake sale? I promise I didn’t sabotage it, and I don’t know **_how_** those damned Vanir won but it wasn’t my fault. Just because I was in charge doesn’t mean I have to take the blame. They had earned an absurd amount of money! I blame it on those overpriced, over-sugared lemon squares. Might as well have called them lemoned sugar or something more apt.” Loki rambled, maintaining a serious facade whilst giving himself time to think. He knew that whole ‘it’s just physical’ bullcrap wouldn’t fly with his brother. He needed to lie his way out.

“No, Loki.” Helblindi shook his head, his face dead serious, and Loki was one of the unfortunate few who knew exactly why. He could still hear Byleistr screaming for mercy. “There’s some rumours about you and Thor Odinson.”

“What about him?” Loki snorted, crossing his arms.

“People have seen you two together.” Helblindi said, slowly. His eyes were flitting from side to side as he whispered. It was clear he didn’t want anyone to hear them.

Loki shrugged. “He’s been harassing me, yes. But he kindly backed off right after the Aesir kidnapped Loptr and Angrboda.”

“Did he tell you they did?” 

“No. But you expect me to believe the word of an Asgardian?” Loki snorted. “Don’t worry, Helblindi, I warned him that if he tried anything again I’d tell father. Seemed to do the trick.”

Helblindi nodded at him, an unreadable expression on his face, which was never a good sign. “Good. Because you know what happened to Byleistr, and I can’t lose another brother.”

Instead of that statement humbling Loki into a solemn mood, he just laughed. “Seriously though, brother? Thor Odinson? Even if was an earg, I like to think I’d have higher standards. I mean, if I could get with _Sigyn_ Alfarsdottir, then the least I could get with would have to be like some king or something.”

Helblindi nodded along, a small, trained smile playing on his face. He hoped that his brother was being honest with him, but with Loki one could never know. He’d lost two family members in the span of three years. He didn’t want to lose a third.

.

At school, since he started rutting with Thor, Loki had grown bolder with Sigyn. He touched her more frequently, kissed her in public. Thor frowned. Loki’s try-hard persona was going to get them both caught. Not to mention that Loki was unfairly leading Sigyn on. If he himself was already over the relationship, it was unfair to keep _her_ tethered to it.

The line for Thor was when he caught a glimpse of a ring-box in Loki’s pocket.

“What is that!?” He pointed at it.

Loki blinked, confused. “I thought I told you, the day we first met, I intend to propose to Sigyn.”

OK, this was just going too far.

“Loki.” Thor breathed, pinching his nose. “We _just_ had sex. We’ve been having sex, quite frequently mind you, for two weeks now. Sometimes more than once a day. You are cheating on your girlfriend- which is never okay- and yet you’re leading her on at the same time.”

“No.” Loki shook his head. “What I have with her is emotional, what I have with you is physical.” Thor didn’t get outraged, because they barely ever talked. Regardless of his own opinions on the matter, one could not deny that, at the least, most of their relationship was just physical. “Therefore it’s not cheating.”

Thor bit his lip and said, “Well, maybe not for you, but I’m sure if you told her you were having sex with, say, another woman, but that it wasn’t cheating, it was purely physical, she’d get pissed. Loki, you can’t keep leading her on.”

“What’s it to you anyways?” Loki asked. “She’s not your girlfriend. What- are you jealous or something?” He snapped. 

“There’s nothing to be jealous of. This isn’t even a real relationship. As you said, it’s purely physical.” Thor was letting his hot-headedness cloud his judgement.

“Good. I’m glad we both see it that way.”

“Great.”

“Good.”

“Absolutely fine.”

“Perfect.”

“Dandy.”

.

Here was a little secret that Loki was keeping on the inside. While his first sexual encounter with Thor, as well as all the moments preceding it, had brought back memories of his late brother, it had been Helblindi’s words that had triggered the _onslaught_ of nightmares. Not just that one nightmare he had from time to time, no, an _onslaught._

_Loki was staring down at Byleistr’s body, gun in his hand. ‘Shoot, shoot, shoot!’ The faceless voices around him chanted. The gun went off, Loki hadn’t even pulled the trigger. It didn’t kill him, just put him in more pain._

_‘No son of mine,’ Laufey snarled down at Byleistr. Then the gun was gone and there was a knife in his hand._

_‘Please?’ Byleistr begged._

_._

_Loki was in a circus, a train car of clowns passed around him, they were the weirdest things he’d ever seen. Their heads were far too big for their bodies, bowling-pin-shaped; and they all had cigarettes sticking out of their mouths._

_‘You killed your bro-_ **_ther_ ** _, you killed your bro-_ **_ther_ ** _.’ They taunted._

_‘No! No!’ He thought. ‘No!’_

_‘You killed your bro-_ **_ther_ ** _, you killed your bro-_ **_ther_ ** _.’ They continued, unrelenting._

_“_ ** _NO!_** ” He screamed, jerking up, sweat all over him. He must’ve been thrashing. It was a good thing his room was so isolated that nobody could hear him.

This was torture. This was a nightmare. It had been dreams like these that had been haunting him for 3 weeks now.

At school the air between Thor and Loki was tense. The entire school seemed to have taken notice of it, despite how Loki had tried to bury their connection. Loki had not gone through with proposing to Sigyn. He had no idea why, externally, but internally, despite everything, despite the danger it put him in, he knew Thor was right. Sigyn was a good girl, she deserved better than him. Maybe he could try- try and be better? He’d been doing so well, they’d been dating three years, he hadn’t cheated on her until now.

It was all Odinson’s fault. He was the one who had made him cheat! Except that cheating was a choice and it was a shitty one that people made to hurt those around them, and Loki felt so, _so_ guilty. He couldn’t break up with Sigyn. Fine, he admitted it, he didn’t love her- not like that at least. He’d been working on it until an Odinson-sized bulldozer had come about wrecking his life. Sometimes he even faked his orgasm, grateful that he had to wear a condom so she’d never find out.

“I haven’t seen you in a week. Fandral’s inside, sleeping.” Thor warned.

“I need to talk to you. It’s not about sex.” Loki stepped in, they went to Thor’s room.

“Oh. Break up with Sigyn yet?”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Thor, it’s not safe.”

“So? It’s not fair on her.”

“Thor, it could _cost me my life!_ ”

“Don’t be so dramatic.”

“Odinson- you have _no idea what Jotunheimr’s like!_ If they find out I’m- if they learn that we’re fucking, I’d be killed!”

“Lo-”

“No Thor! You don’t understand what it’s like! You live in a world full of fucking privilege! Your family knows you’re a homosexual- or a bisexual, whatever! If my family found out, they’d kill me like they killed Byleistr!”

“Wait- **_what_**!?” Thor blinked. He had _not_ been expecting a fucking atom bomb to drop down on him like he was Hiroshima or some shit like that. “By- when- how di?”

“I shot him.” Loki said, coldly. “Laufey found out that he was bisexual- they’d caught him kissing another man or something, the details are murky. They had to make an example out of him. Laufey was particularly furious about it because our family doesn’t breed fags. They tortured him for days, I didn’t know where he was or what was happening, then Laufey brings me to a room one day and there’s Byleistr, all bloodied-up and in pain, half his teeth missing, chunks of hair gone, swollen face, virtually unrecognisable. Laufey makes a speech,” Loki said that bit candidly, like he didn’t remember every single fucking word in that speech. Like he didn’t remember the feeling that that speech was directed at him, regardless of Laufey never explicitly stating that it was a warning for Loki, "and hands me a gun. I shot him. Thor, I killed my brother, and if I dump Sigyn, they’ll-”

Thor cut him off with a hug. A long, platonic, hug. After a while Loki buried his head into Thor’s chest and started crying. Thor kissed the top of Loki’s head, holding him. Eventually, Thor unscrambled himself from Loki, laying back down on the bed, bringing Loki down with him. Just as he’d thought: Loki’d fallen asleep. Damn Loki looked cute when he cried, red nose and all. Thor felt guilty for thinking that, what was wrong with him?

Thor scooched to the side a little to give the other man some room to rest peacefully, before going to the bottom of the bed, removing Loki’s shoes, and replacing his shirt with a nightshirt (no, he wasn’t going to undress for bed as usual, even with someone he’d been having regular sex with it felt inappropriate to make any sort of perceivable sexual situation possible when they were asleep and you weren’t- modesty never killed anyone, he supposed) and his pants with some shorts. He’d have been wearing nightclothes already if he hadn’t procrastinated into the night by watching funny videos on the web.

Thor took a chug of water, peed, and went to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told y'all this was gonna be dark 😂😭 And now we know why Loki's the way he is ;) More to come on how Byleistr died. Note: my demeanour in this end note would likely be different had I just written this chapter- it was different when I'd written the main summary for the story too because I'd JUST written the second-last chapter (I wrote the ending the on the 12th and the second-last on the 13th) and was in a serious mind frame then. Whatever, you'll see ;)


	20. I’ll be your teacher, I’ll show you the ropes (you the ropes)

Loki woke up to find himself curled into… Thor’s ar- wai- oh righ- wait why hadn’t he left? Had he just gone and fallen asleep? Well, he supposed it had been late… oh well, he’d just tell everyone at home, assuming they even asked, that he’d gone on an early morning jog or something.

Thor was roused by the change in pressure on his arm. Ooh, his arm felt tender, it was **_definitely_** going to bruise. How long had Loki been sleeping on it?

“I need to go.” Loki said, getting up.

“Loki?”

“Yeah?”

“How-how long ago did Laufey- er, you know… Byleistr?”

Loki contemplated the question. There was no real harm, he supposed, in answering it. “About 3 years ago.” Interesting.

“So right after he graduated?” Loki nodded.

“Sorry.”

Loki shrugged. “Shit happens.” That just broke Thor’s heart a little.

“If you ever want to talk about it… I’m here.”

“I’ve said all there is to say.” Loki shrugged, knowing full-well it was a lie.

“Well, alright.”

“See ya.”

.

9 people had died in a bombing. No news from the media as to whether or not it was gang-related, but given it happened in the upper-east, Thor could only guess that it was. That was Vanaheim, and the witnesses had reported seeing a man in a leather jacket- though some Vanir wore that style. Most Vanir wore frocks and loose, hippy-type clothing, but some did indeed wear leather jackets. Vanir Leather was so good they used it in the army, after all.

Thor had, of course, no way of verifying it at the present because it was the Christmas Holidays and they couldn’t very well risk leaving a digital trail to show Odin that they’d been communicating about gang-stuff. Not while Thor was exiled. Speaking to him at school was one thing, Odin couldn’t stop them being friends, and conversations were, in general, untraceable (unless of course if someone was recording).

Speaking of Odin, it was Family Lunch time in two days. It had been over a month since Thor’d been cast out. 4 times a year the Odinsons had a special family lunch. Frigga usually cooked it, but this time, with Thor banished, they were doing it at a restaurant. Thor was told to dress fancy. They were having it at Fish-Fish, a popular, upscale restaurant in Midgard.

Thor sat at the table in a tux with a bow-tie, delighted to see that Baldr was similarly dressed up. Their father had a full suit on, jacket, monocle, and everything. Their mother was wearing a nice little sundress with her best pearls.

It was, of course, a little awkward to begin with, what with Thor having had been cast out, but soon after they’d placed their orders, everything was back to a type of pseudo-normal.

“I still don’t understand how Vanaheim won.” Baldr pouted. He’d been head-baker, he felt useless.

“I heard a rumour they got Freyr to auction himself off to whoever bought the most cakes.” Thor said.

“And yet you didn’t offer to do it?” Baldr looked betrayed.

“Baldr Odinson! Your brother is not a prostitute!” Frigga scolded. Baldr gave her a look.

“He did Rich Bitch once.” Referring to a particularly scandalous magazine-cover photoshoot that had led him to be grounded for a month. So what if he was topless with his pants ‘too low’? It was _his life, mom!_ (Thor did, of course, refrain from mentioning that in hindsight it wasn’t his proudest public photo. Nor that he’d hid his special copy of that edition of the magazine at the bottom of his sock-drawer after discovering it two years later and feeling ashamed).

“And we’ve been burdened with that reminder ever since.” Odin grumbled.

At some point Frigga and Baldr had both left to use the bathroom. Thor turned to his father.

“Uh, father… I need to ask you a question.”

“Son, if it’s gang-related-”

“It is, but **_please_** listen.” Thor interrupted his father, which naturally drew Odin’s attention. “Father, if someone was in another gang, could they, possibly, by any chance transfer into another?”

Odin went quiet. “It would depend on a lot of factors. Their rank and whether or not the two clans were friendly or hostile, for starters. Why’re they transferring? If it’s marriage, it’s usually okay so long as the gangs are friendly, if it’s on a whim it’s unlikely that the new gang would take them.”

Thor bit his lip. He couldn’t give Loki away. Good thing that there were other gangs the Aesir hated. “Er, say someone wanted to transfer in from Svatalfheim, like Bonkeith or his little brother?”

Odin burst out laughing. “ ** _Svartalfheim_**? Goodness Thor, no! And if we didn’t kill them, those rabid dogs they call Dark Elves would do it for us! You’d have to be stupid to think that the crown family of any gang would let you take one of their own!”

“Didn’t you give up Vili and Vé to Vanaheim?”

“Vé for marriage, Vili to keep him company. It was a marriage-pact, Thor, the same reason that your mother, Frigga, joined us with her two ladies in waiting: Sif’s mother, Anja, and Hogun’s mother, Byla.”

Thor nodded. “Thanks for the info.” Odin nodded too.

“And unfortunately Asgard doesn’t take in refugees, regardless of how bad their home-gang might be, because it would lead to unnecessary conflict as well as the inevitable loss of Aesir lives in combat. Thor, son, this world’s a harsh one. The only way to get out of a gang here is to leave Nine altogether, change your identity, and live a low-profile life. I’m sorry son.”

“It’s okay.” Thor nodded. Except that it wasn’t. It couldn’t be okay. How could it be okay? Thor wished Loki had never told him about Byleistr’s fate. How was Thor supposed to rest easy knowing that the same could become of Loki at any moment?

.

Thor’s unease, quite guiltily, did not result in a termination of their ‘relationship’ or whatever it was, which would have undoubtedly put Loki in a much safer place. Oh no.

Take, for instance, that exact moment, where Thor was combing his hands through Loki’s fingers and moaning as the younger male took him into his mouth.

Loki had always looked at Thor’s cock reverently (who wouldn’t?), and Thor had jokingly suggested that he wanted Loki to suck on his cock.

Guess what Loki did? Thor was starting to wonder how much of Loki’s internalised homophobia was manufactured, possibly as a self-protection mechanism over what was undoubtedly a traumatic experience for Loki, and how much of it was genuine. 

“Yeah, baby, yeah! Oh yeah, suck it like that. Run your tongue over the slit on my dic- _argh_!” Oh Thor was so close. “Play with my balls. No, with your hands,” Thor guided Loki’s hands to Thor’s dick. “Oooh, I’m gonna cum! Oh!” Thor pulled back and respectfully directed his dick away from Loki so as to not spray him with his cum. 

Thor proceeded to repay Loki with a blowjob of his own, going deep down so his mouth would engulf the entirety of Loki’s dick as he sprayed his load. He felt Loki’s toes curling and uncurling against his leg. The sweet sensation of utter victory that accompanied making one’s partner reach climax was written all over Thor’s face. Loki cuffed him (lightly) for it, Thor caught Loki’s hand and kissed it.

.

The outside world was not so peaceful. A brick was smashed through a window, a child almost kidnapped, and a head beaten to near-death with a lead-pipe.

It was seeming more and more like the Dark Elves’ plan was going to come to fruition after all.


	21. You’ll see a side of love you’ve never known (never known)

So, Loki happened to wind up in a sort-of fight with Logi. Loki’d made a comment about Logi being a crackhead, which resulted in the, should-have-been-expected, ‘oh, so you think you’re better than me’, some punches were thrown (nowhere near as bad as Thor v Angrboda), and long-story short Loki was doing his best to avoid the gang, despite it including his girlfriend and best-friend. Logi and Angrboda were pals, but you didn’t have to be a rocket-scientist to deduce that were he given the choice Angrboda would choose Loki every single damned time.

And this was why he wound up going to lunch early. The cafeteria was still packed, sure, but at least he wouldn’t run into the others. He’d just say he had an assignment due or something if caught. He spied a table where a girl was sitting alone. It was in a corner. Perfect. 

“Hi, may I sit here?” Loki asked, politely.

“Sure.” The girl didn’t even look up from her phone to acknowledge him. She was typing something. He flushed, thinking back to when Thor had stopped pursuing him (allegedly), he clearly had a thing for people who didn’t notice him. She eventually stopped and looked up. “Hi!” She greeted.

“Hi.” He said, mid-way through his mac-and-cheese. Or what he assumed to be mac-and-cheese.

“My name’s Verity. What’s yours?”

Hold up. Who in this thrice damned country didn’t know who Loki was!? Let alone the school! “Loki.”

She hummed. “Loki… Laufeyson? The Law Student?”

“Yeah.” He blinked and realised. “Wait a second, when you said ‘Verity’ you don’t- you’re not Verity Willis, the School Newspaper Reporter, are you?”

“The one and only.” She smiled.

“Didn’t you write that article that got Jeeves fired?” Loki was referring to a professor who had sexually assaulted a handful of his classmates.

“Indeed I am. Almost got expelled for that one, the Law Students helped me out there.”

“I love your work!”

“I’ve heard of yours. Silver tongue, they call you.”

“That’s because none of the other lawyers can ever string a thought together.”

“Didn’t you win that pro-bono case for those homeless women? The wrongful eviction one?”

“Yeah.” Loki snorted. “Where does a women’s shelter get off telling battered wives that they can’t stay there unless they’ve _tried_ to reconcile with their abusive piece of shit husbands? And not letting them stay there with kids? _What the actual fuck_?”

“I know right! What were those women supposed to do? Leave the kids with furious fathers who’d likely commit a murder suicide with them?”

“Thank you!” Goodness, Loki had lucked out upon meeting the purply-red-haired girl.

They spent the next four hours discussing other things. 

It was the best maybe-mac-and-cheese that Loki’d ever had.

.

Their group had reconciled in the most Jotunn way possible: ‘The Joint’ was full, so they went to Loki’s to do drugs.

“Why’ve you been avoiding us?” Angrboda accused Loki, only slightly hopped up on coke.

“I haven’t.”

“Yeah you have. Haven’t seen you at lunch all week. This about the fight with Logi?” Yes. Loki’d had a broken nose that Thor’d kissed better after claiming that his kisses were medicine. Oh yes, very medical-sounding, Future-Doctor-Odinson. Loki was so glad that Thor was just doing it to make himself smarter and more diagnostic in order to lead his gang better, and **_not_** to actually practice on a patient. Thor **_totally_** was the type to try and kiss some poor, unfortunate soul’s cancer away.

Why was he thinking about Thor? 

“No. I’ve just been busy doing extra-credit to make up for that last test.” Loki shrugged.

“Don’t lie to me, Lokes.” Angrboda put his hand on Loki’s shoulder suddenly. “We used to be so close… what happened?”

Loki thought around for an honest answer. “We’ve grown apart.” Loki admitted. Scary. Prior to the past month and a bit they’d been joint at the hip, after that… Loki took Angrboda’s hand. “We’re still best-friends. Nothing’s ever going to change that. Don’t worry, ‘Boda. Every friendship has a dry spell.”

“’t fucking sucks.” Angrboda moped.

Indeed it did.

.

“Checkmate.” Thor declared, having had won their third round of chess.

“What the fuck? _How are you beating me_?” Loki fumed.

“I… used to play chess competitively when I was a kid.” Thor admitted. “Got all the way up to a Candidate Master Title. I got bored playing the same old people, not a lot of kids my age, so I dropped it.”

“You were a CM?”

“Titles don’t disappear, so I still am.”

“I’m sorry, it’s just… I never pegged you as the chess-type.” Thor shrugged.

“The game’s mostly about how much you can memorise. Strategy’s actually less important than most people give it credit for. Of course, it depends on the person. Baldr learned the Petroff, the Pirc, like seventeen variants of the Sicilian, Queen’s Gambit, etc. I only ever bothered with the Petroff and the Sicilian Dragon, and transferred knowledge gained from the Dragon to apply to all of my games. I didn’t get quite as far as him, I’m not so much the memorisation type as the implementation type, but you get what I’m saying, right?”

“Uh huh.” Loki nodded. He’d never heard of those openings. Well, he’d heard of the Sicilian, everybody had, but like what was a ‘perk’ even? “Well, I guess I better reward you for winning.”

Thor shrugged. “I’d rather go down on you, I think. Just promise to keep your mouth open.” He kissed Loki’s jaw. “I like hearing your noises- and it’ll drive Fandral _nuts_.”

.

There was a group of Jotnar- Jotnar-Jotnar, not Dark Elves disguised as Jotnar- who had robbed a hotel that was Aesir owned. Loki had heard sirens on the way home from Thor’s, he’d had no idea that this was what had gone down.

“Were you with them!?” Laufey had boomed. The Jotnar had been disciplined. Not killed, but whipped a hundred times each. Those scars would last well into their grandchildren’s childbearing years. Laufey shook Loki, not even giving him a chance to speak. “Answer me!!” He roared.

“No, no!” Loki insisted. “I was out on a walk!”

“At 2 AM!?” Laufey was pressing down so hard that Loki could feel the flesh in his arms begin to give way for his father’s fingers.

“Yes! I’d had a nightmare about Bylei-” Laufey slapped him so hard before he’d even managed to get the words out. “Get out of my face, and if I catch you out past 10 PM ever again **_I_** will be the one whipping you! Go to your room!”

Loki rushed to his room, quickly, grabbing some ice from his mini-fridge (it had a freezer compartment) and applying it to his face. It would still bruise, there was no denying that, but there’d be markably less swelling. There was a normal slap, like the one’s Loki’s mother used to give him before she’d been shipped off to an insane asylum following Byleistr’s murder. Normal slaps didn’t leave marks, just a stinging sensation for maybe 2 or 3 minutes after being slapped. Then there was a **_Laufey_** slap. Those ones always left marks.

He fell asleep on the cheek that hadn’t been slapped.

.

“What happened?” Thor looked aghast as he traced his hand gently over Laufey’s hand-print.

“My father caught me out late at night and assumed I had something to do with the hotel robbery- I _didn’t_ , but you already know that since you’re my alibi.”

“Oh, Loki.” Thor sighed. 

“I won’t come again this month… but after that, he’ll lose interest.” Loki shrugged.

“Of course. I’m so sorry for the trouble I’ve caused.”

“What trouble? I snuck out to see you.”

“I know, but…” But I can’t help but take _some_ responsibility. Maybe if I hadn’t insisted on a fourth round of chess you wouldn’t have been caught? “Alright. We’ll have to be even more discrete, I guess.”

“Affirmative.” Loki dragged Thor into the closet.


	22. I can see it going down, going down

It was inevitable that Odin and Laufey should have a meeting.

“I do not know where or how this started,” Odin confessed.

“Me neither.” Odin could not necessarily trust Laufey’s words, but what choice did he have? The last gang war had decimated 3/4s of Asgard’s population- heck it had wiped out half of Nine! “I’m assuming that some rogue Jotunn or something must have invaded Asgard- they’d probably heard about a prolific fa-gay person and gotten angry or something, but we haven’t managed to find them.”

“Haven’t managed or haven’t tried?” Odin snarled. Jotunheim’s homophobia had always pissed him off. 

“What? You would accuse me of committing an act of war?” Laufey asked, outraged.

“I’m saying maybe you would turn a blind eye if the victim of a crime was **_gay_**.”

“Oh please! You haven’t caught the Aesir who murdered Loptr and Angrboda!”

“We haven’t managed to find anyone! For all we know you _faked_ that video to get money from us!”

“Money from- **_four adults have lost their two children! Six siblings have lost one of theirs- you think_** **_I_ ** **_did this!?”_ **

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“No. And neither would it be the first time that **_you_** faked a crime to get me to cooperate. Remember the end of the last gang war?”

“I did what I needed to. You weren’t listening- just like right now!”

“Ah ha! So you admit to having had faked this!”

“I didn’t! A man lost his husband, and you think I’m behind it all!”

“You set fire to Vé’s house, with his young, pregnant wife in it-”

“I did no such thing!” Odin shouted.

“Oh really? Then you expect me to believe that the next day you just _coincidentally_ walked into a marriage agreement to end the Aesir-Vanir War? Huh? What kind of fool do you take me for?”

“The kind of fool you portray yourself as!”

“Have it your way, Odinson. But just know that should our gangs meet, your death will be at my hands.”

“Bring it on, bastard son of Lauti!” Odin bit right back.

.

Late-night rendez-vous, it had been Thor’s idea, since they couldn’t really meet at his. Loki wore a wig, some clip-on earrings, a dress, and a pair of shades. Completely unrecognisable, that was all they were going for. Thor, for his part, wore shades and a brown wig. They looked like some weird, nondescript couple (oh Norns, when and where had they passed that stage?)

This rendez-vous was taking place in Midgard, where ‘nobody knew [them]’.

They walked along the Plebeian Bridge: a broad, archway with gothic carvings put into it. It overlooked the main river in the city, the Njord.

Nine was so beautiful, and Loki had never realised it. He was willing to bet that most people had never realised it. Most people in this country were so caught up in gang affairs, they never stopped and bothered to look up and just enjoy life. Look at this bridge, for example! It could easily accommodate 200 or 300 people without fears of resonance, and yet it was just him and Thor on it! On a beautiful night like this even!

“There’s a, uh, gulley further out. Super secluded, nobody ever goes there.”

“You want to…?” Loki asked.

“No, no.” Thor shook his head, smiling. “There’s probably snakes and stuff there… have you ever heard of the tale of Jormungandr?”

“The World Serpent? No, never heard of him.”

“Very funny.” Thor deadpanned. “They say he lives in this river.”

“They also say he’s a hundred feet long and has a venom so potent just inhaling it will be enough to kill you.”

Thor pinched his nose, “better safe than sorry,” he said in a weird voice, prompting Loki to laugh.

“Was there a reason you called me here?”

“Just thought it’d be nice to see you once before everything goes to shit. I heard from Baldr that father’s meeting with Laufey left him incensed.”

“Yeah. My father broke the wedding vase his grandparents gave him. Smashed a painting my mother had made.”

“My father just went outside and started screaming at trees apparently. Baldr found it frightening.” 

“Hey, how is Baldr anyways?”

Thor thought back to the hooded-eyed, unbathed, slightly smelly, sleep-deprived, slack-jawed young man who’d visited him the previous day. “He’s doing alright.” Baldr’d seemed happy enough, nothing out of sorts with him.

“Good to hear. Anyways, they’re running tests on the fibres found in Angrboda and Loptr’s house. There were some hairs there too, so we’ll be able to track down our culprit easy.” Loki turned to Thor. “I trust we’ll have your full co-operation in providing DNA samples?”

“Of course. And I am to believe that in exchange we’ll be getting some interviews in with your lot?”

Loki hummed for a while. “Deal.”

“Good.”

“Excellent.” 

Loki hadn’t been sure how far Thor would take the night. In truth, this whole thing made him entirely nervous. He knew what happened to fags, he didn’t want to meet his brother’s fate. At least Byleistr’d had prospects with women, Loki was wholly disinterested in them.

“Shall we take one last round of the bridge and head off? It’s almost your curfew.” Loki nodded, following. This was madness. He’d been raised from birth to hate Aesir… though, he supposed, he’d also been taught from life experiences to hate Jotnar, so he supposed all was fair.

The other question he had to keep asking himself was ‘why am I doing this?’ And indeed, why _was_ Loki doing this? It was dangerous, it was immoral, it went against their culture…

Why indeed? 

. 

Steve Stevenson had been brought to jail. He’d seen a Jotunn in the streets and clocked the guy. There was a minor scuffle. Steve had been arrested. He spat in the corner. Jotunn cowards, hiding behind the law despite mostly _breaking_ said laws.

The door to his cell opened. It was the local sheriff. “Alright, you’re free to go.”

“I haven’t paid bail.”

“It’s been covered.” Steve stepped out of the cell.

At the door to the compound stood the Allfather.

“Allfather.” Steve bowed. Odin shook his head. “Don’t worry, you’re not in trouble, son. This is a time of war. We need to keep our guards up.”

“Aye, Allfather.” Steve nodded, scurrying along and getting into Odin’s car.


	23. In my head, I see you all over me

It had been a while since they’d had a bonfire.

Not a community one, no. Just a nice, happy, friendly one. They could’ve had a barbecue, but they didn’t want this for eating, just drinking and having fun.

Loki sat with Svadilfari as he tossed away another cigarette. Angrboda was flirting with Skadi, Logi and ‘Saxa were playing x’s and o’s on the sand. ‘Saxa was looking thinner these days, which Loki thought was odd. Oh whatever, his vain cousin was likely on another one of those diets of his. It was so weird, ‘Saxa worked so hard to fit in with the Jotun males that one would think he’d try and _bulk up_ , not slim down.

Sigyn was off showing Drrf something on her phone. Drrf was laughing, cute kid, really. Sigyn looked so beautiful and maternal in the candlelight. It concerned Loki deeply that his affection for her was only friend-deep.

Svad popped a beer bottle open and chugged it like the absolute beast that he was: tall; muscular; just one big, built-ass wall of hot smoking- fucking Thor. Look at how far Loki had fallen. He’d gone from being a somewhat respectable Jotunn to being an utter and complete laughing stock. His heart clenched. If his dirty little secret ever got out… he inhaled deeply. Svad eyed him, an odd expression on his face.

Svad then turned his eyes to where Loki was looking and smiled softly, a dopey look in his eyes. “Ah, I get it… you know, you really lucked out with her.” He said, wistfully. It was then that Loki switched his gaze to Svadilfari’s eyes. Did Svad…? _No!_

He felt a flare of outrage at the thought of his friend lusting over his girlfriend. How dare Svad!?

Wait… he glanced from his friend to his girlfriend. His thoughts drifted back to Thor. Thor was right. It was selfish of him to be using Sigyn as a diversion knowing that he… didn’t love her. Not like that, anyways. In fact, if he were being totally truthful, usually when she touched him he maybe just maybe flinched a little. God he hoped he wasn’t obvious when he did that. It was just a bit weird was all.

And if Svadilfari **_did_** really like Sigyn… she’d be happy with him, he was sure. Was it fair for him to keep doing this? Stringing her along while if he’d just break up with her, there’d be someone waiting for her? She’d sure be happier with someone who loved her than someone who didn’t. And after three years in a relationship- _twelve_ as friends- didn’t he owe it to her to do so?

He stared into the fire. His heart sinking and guilt setting in because regardless of what was right and wrong, what was imminent was his death if Laufey ever found out that he was gay.  ~~ Wasn’t that why he’d asked Sigyn out in the first place? ~~ “Yeah. Totally.” 

.

Sunday morning brunch at Thor and Fandral’s- since the other blond had unofficially decided to stay with Thor, at least for the time being. It was cute, but also annoying as heck. Ever have to listen to your best-friend singing ‘Haven’t Had Enough’ by fricking Mariana’s Trench at 3AM while he was taking an ‘early’ shower? No? Count yourself lucky. MTrench wasn’t Thor’s thing before, and after Fandral’s little ‘The Voice’ moment, it never would be. The only thing that could have been worse was if he were singing My Chem, because Thor might just have had to end up hating his favourite band over that. No, really.

Fandral was flipping eggs in his undies, wearing an apron that said ‘Daddy  ❤️ ’. Fandral and Thor could literally be naked together, despite both being bi (well, Thor’d heard about the term ‘pan’ and he actually thought it might apply to him better- Thor **_really_** didn’t give a fuck. He blamed it on his fertility god namesake) and nothing would ever happen. The bromance was too strong.

“So, who’s the lucky lady you’ve been having around these past few weeks?” Thor almost spat out his eggs.

“What?”

“Oh, you know. The mystery chick- er, or man, of course.”

Thor debated his options, then sighed dramatically. “Well, if you must know, it’s Hogun.” Fandral spun on it. “Just kidding, but now I know I’m right about you, Hogun and Sif- don’t worry, I’d never tell anyone, just trying to satisfy my own curiosity.” He **_needed_** this conversation to switch focuses, and had decided that the easiest way was to throw it onto Fandral.

“Well, yeah I guess. But don’t tell anyone.”

Thor made a ‘zip’ motion over his lips, implying that they were sealed. Fandral then went off into length about the three’s sexploits, and Thor zoned back out again.


	24. In my head, you fulfil my fantasies

It hit everyone differently and at different times, didn’t it? That whole ‘wait, wtf am I doing?’ moment. In Loki’s case, the argument could be made that deep down he’d always known he was gay, but that his society, coupled with Byleistr’s death, had forced him to push those feelings deeper in. After all, it was days after Byleistr’s death that he’d taken up his first and only girlfriend, Sigyn. One could then go on to propose that the UST suffered by both Thor and Loki finally coming to an end was a key factor in just **_why_** this took so damned long to sink in. Another could argue that it wasn’t exactly like Loki had been patting himself on the back for indulging in this sick fantasy either. Nonetheless, that day of dread was here and there was no stopping it.

It took Loki a full two hours to get out of bed that morning, and _no_ , he wasn’t on his phone. He was thinking. He blinked back tears. He was everything he’d been raised to hate, wasn’t he? The only thing worse would be if he were a transexual or something.

No. No, he **_wasn’t_** gay. He wasn’t a fag like his brother. **_Thor_** was the gay one. It must have rubbed off on him, like that folie à deux bullshit but with homosexuality.

Fuck Thor.

.

“Loki? It’s the middle of the day! Are you **_insane_**?” Thor hissed, _yanking_ Loki in so hard that he almost tripped over the change in momentum.

“I’m not gay. And I’ve just come here to tell you that.” What? The only appropriate way to describe Thor’s eyes would be to say that they looked like that of a comic-book character.

“Yeah you are.” Fuck political correctness, Thor saw all the differences in the way that Loki looked at both Sigyn and Angrboda. He knew. Though to be fair, he should have also been expecting this, shouldn’t he have? He was unsurprised that Jotunheimr’s homophobic climate had led Loki to denying his sexuality for so long… he realised how much like a rapist he sounded, but he wasn’t on a mission to force Loki to sleep with him or anything. If Loki were some random stranger on the sidewalk, he wouldn’t have even given him the time of day. But the way Loki flip-flopped on this was seriously breaking Thor’s heart- and fuck it, he had emotions too!

“No I’m not! I wasn’t before I met you, and I won’t be after! Whatever lies between us ends here!”

“Loki-”

“No son of Odin! I don’t know what kind of gay spell you put on be, but it’s not going to work anymore!”

“Gay sp- _You can’t turn someone gay!”_

“Of course you can! I looked it up! It happens in prisons all the time!”

“People might temporarily develop a taste for certain flesh **_because there are no other options and people are_** **_horny_ ** , YOU have a **_girlfriend_** and you came into my bed! And don’t think I didn’t notice the way that you were looking at Angrboda before that!”

Loki slapped Thor. “Don’t you **_ever_** mention ‘Boda’s name! He’s too good for you, filth!”

“ _Angrboda, Angrboda, Angrboda!_ ”

It was the best sex Thor’d ever had in his life.

.

Later on in the day, post afterglow, Thor would cuddle up with Loki and watch some RuPaul. RuPaul was all about self-expression and embracing what was on the inside. Thor thought that Loki maybe hadn’t gotten enough of that growing up- after all the times he’d met Laufey, he was **_certain_** he wasn’t the nurturing type, and any form of ‘nurturing’ he may be had probably been all hogged up by his heir- and that maybe this would help him feel a bit more internally at peace.

“I hope Courtney wins.” Loki said at some point. Bitch, Thor was rooting for Bianca the whole way, just like he had when he’d first watched this season two years ago (he’d only gotten into Drag Race when he was 18).

.

Angela swept up the bar top. It wasn’t uncommon for patrons to visit in the afternoons rather than at night, some people just wanted a nice, quiet spot to collect their thoughts or chat to a friend.

“Two margaritas, please!” A man with a rat-like face handed her silver piece. That was worth a **_lot_** more than two margaritas. She assumed he was going to be ordering more. That was like at least 8 margaritas, with some rounding.

Two more men came in. They were both laughing, whispering inside jokes amongst themselves. They sat with the others, and the rat-man held up his hand to indicate that it would be **_four_** margaritas.

She prepared them then whipped out her phone to go onto Instagram. These people looked poor. Not by their clothes, just by their general presentation. She hummed, flipping through her home page, liking random photos, **_eavesdropping_**. 

‘…tomorrow…’

‘…never suspect us…’

‘…Aesir…’ that one caught her interest. She listened closer.

‘…ith will be pleased.’

‘…me later… Jotunheim.’

Angela was frowning. These people were very obviously neither Aesir nor Jotnar. Why were they discussing either gang? She reasoned that there was a possibility that they were from another gang and were trying to pick which side to support in the **_imminent_** gang war… but something about these men made her feel uneasy.

She held her phone a bit higher, making sure both flash and he ringer were off.

( _Click_ )

.

Volstagg walked to the grocery store from MU. He wanted to pick up a bottle of water and Norns knew that the water at school was **_way_** overpriced. He’d forgotten his water bottle at home because he’d woken up a bit late.

A bat was swung at his head from behind. Trying to gather his wits to fight off whoever did that, somebody else went for his legs. He recognised the jackets of the people who had come to start punching him.

**_Jotnar_**.

Not that it mattered. Despite being the size of an actual bear (something that the men in his family were all rather quite proud of), he only managed to knock of three of them into oncoming traffic before the one with the bat struck again.

And again.

And again…


	25. In my head, you’ll be screaming oh

In hindsight, driving to a hospital on a motorbike, when your head was in a fog was not a good idea. One could argue though that it was bound to get you to the hospital faster than the motorbike you were taking. Fortunately though, Thor and Fandral suffered no accidents along their trip.

They met Sif and Hogun at the hospital.

“How is he?” Fandral asked, marching in.

“They won’t tell us. We’re not family.” Sif said, dismayed.

“They did mention that it’s nothing too serious, and that they expect him to make a full recovery, though.” Hogun added.

“They also say he should be discharged by the end of the week.” Sif sighed in relief. 

Thor looked at his three friends, the ones he was left with, and suddenly felt a bit awkward and out of place. It was like he was third-wheeling, but there was already three wheels, so more like fourth-wheeling.

Thor stuck around for a half an hour, just because he didn’t want to make it **_too_** awkward by leaving immediately. He knew he was only prolonging the other three’s grief, it was obvious that they wanted to be there for each other. Still, he made smalltalk.

“Any idea what happened?” He asked.

“They say he got jumped.” Sif responded.

“Jotnar?”

“Who else?”

“Good point.”

“Thor, how’s it going on the… you know, uh, **_Ben_** front.”

“Ben’s fine. He’s just taking a while to get comfortable.” Understatement of the year. Loki and Thor had barely seen each other the past week. Not that their schedule was a consistent one in general, but usually Loki’d stop by at least once or twice. He felt a bit weird about how weird he felt about it.

“Good. And you’re not pushing Ben a bit too far?”

“No, Sif. I’m being respectful of his boundaries.” They were, of course, trying to be as quiet as possible so that the other two wouldn’t hear. Eventually Thor took off and left them to each other.

He didn’t know why, but he just really, **_really_** hoped that Loki would be waiting for him when he got home.

But alas, dreams never came true, now did they?

.

Well now obviously, Fandral and Thor being two hot-headed, young individuals **_had_** to do something to get revenge on the Jotnar for the attack on Volstagg. They owed it to their people- nay, to their **_rugby_** **_team_**!

Fandral had come home from the hospital, a desperate, aggrieved look in his eyes. How was Thor supposed to deny him an opportunity for revenge? Nobody even needed to know, they were doing it fo themselves, after all.

Thor had declared Loki off limits, and warned that if they attacked his group then the blame would **_immediately_** be cast upon them. Fandral seemed to agree. Thor volunteered Kari’s, Loki’s cousin’s, group instead. They were close enough that it would hurt Jotunheim, but far enough not to be blamed for it. Besides, Thor knew that Loki hated his cousin anyways- said he was as bad as Laufey.

They weren’t going to kill anyone. They wanted revenge, not compensation. They keyed the man’s car and slashed his tyres. Only three, so insurance wouldn’t cover it. 

It was the perfect crime.

.

_I need to ask you about the attack on Kari’s car. Meet me at 9._ Came the text.

**Fuck _yes!_** Thor thought as he ate his cereal.

.

“You’ve been avoiding me.” Thor accused, as the female-disguised Loki approached him on the highway. They were on the footpath of a very busy bridge known as the Bifrost. 

“I’ve been busy.” Thor turned to take Loki in. His skin was pale and he looked agitated. “There’s been a lot of turmoil within Jotunheim.”

“I can tell.” Thor brushed a hand across Loki’s forehead. “You look like you’ve been frowning a lot.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You’re insufferable.” Loki snapped. “Did you do it? Did you key Kari’s car?”

“No, why?”

“I heard some Jotnar got the jump on your friend.”

“So _this_ you admit was Jotunheim?”

“I don’t have time for your childishness, Thor. I only report on what I know to be a fact.”

“So why haven’t you turned in your men for Mjoll’s murder.”

“Because unlike **_you_** I can only speak what is true!”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

**_“There’s CCTV footage of two men that look like you and your friend, Fandral, keying Mjoll’s car, Thor! Fandral even winked at the camera!”_** Loki exploded.

“I admit to nothing.” 

Loki pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fine, look, whatever. If you’re going to be uncooperative, then maybe it’s best that we both just end this meeting here.”

“Fine.”

“Yeah.”

“ ** _Good_**.”

.

Apparently Thor hadn’t done a good enough job disguising himself with just the shades and baseball cap. He stared in horror at the front page of _The Nine Gazette_. There was a photo, clearly taken at the start of the altercation, where if one could imagine Thor’s eyes, Thor looked pining almost. He snorted. He had never once in his life pined over anyone, let alone Loki.

The title read: _Odinson’s New Paramour_

Skuld, he couldn’t read the rest!

Well, he could, but like… two sentences per hour, then he’d get up, do something, and come right back to it. He whipped out his phone, took a photo of it, and posted it on his Story: not my paramour, barely a friend, just a hookup, dw ladies ;)

Oh Verdandi, he had to talk to Loki about this! If someone tried to do one of those genderbent!sketches of the lady in the photo, they’d realise it looked a heck of a lot like Loki, and then he’d be doomed.

.

“What are we going to do?” Thor waggled the newspaper.

“You need to sleep with someone. Throw them off our trail.” Loki said, anxiously.

“What? That’s insane! I don’t want to play some poor person like that!”

“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice.” Loki said, solemnly.

Yeah he did, and he wasn’t going to do it. No fucking way.

.

Alright, but Amora practically _threw herself_ at him at the club that night. She must have seen the story and gotten jealous. 

He made love to her, but it wasn’t as satisfying as usual. He felt empty and hollow, and to be honest, kind of cheapened afterwards.

Either way, it had the desired affect. Her name was the one next to his the next day in the headline’s, and it was her photo, not Loki’s.

~~ How amazing would it be if they didn’t have to hide? If he could publicly and fearlessly have Loki next to him on a front page? Pretty fucking terrific… ~~


	26. In my head, it’s going down, in my head, it’s going down, in my head

Loki and Thor sat in the park at midnight, discussing what was going on in their gangs. Three Jotnar had been killed in a pipe bomb incident. Thor had a hard time feeling sorry for them knowing that it had been an accident, and that the bomb was **_supposed_** to be planted in Aesir territory.

There had also been a gun fight in which all ten members involved had been killed- one of those members was a Light Elf, but nobody knew which end he was fighting on, and it wasn’t like he could be questioned now that he was dead.

They were inching closer and closer to war. It was alarming. Thor put an arm around Loki in comfort.

“Oh well, at least with a war, father’ll be less focused on me.” Loki huffed. That was true.

“It’ll get real nasty, my mom said.”

“My mom’s in a mental institution because she couldn’t cope with Byleistr’s death.” Loki admitted, lowly.

Thor hugged Loki tighter. This world was so damned unfair. He should have been able to enjoy this park, with its wild assortment of flowers and its fountains and its general ambience with Loki: but not only were they confined to nighttime rendezvouses, they were also in the midst of a rather tumultuous period of Nine’s history. Thor had no doubt that these next few weeks, these months, these **_years_** would be sung about for centuries, in the same way that they sometimes sung about the other wars.

‘ _And then Great uncle Bor went and lopped off Ymir’s head’_ went one lullaby.

Or better: ‘ _The Jotnar came a crawling, but Odin bid them bay_

_Locked up in Jotunheim, to live another day_

_And Laufey came up wondering why he’d been dealt an awful bunch_

_But Odin thwacked his head innnn… and Frigga and he had lunch.’_ In reference to one of the last points of the last war. The infamous Lunch at Rosegate.

He could picture his own with Loki, almost:

_‘A handsome lad called Thor went and grabbed a Jotunn bride_

_The Jotunn bride resisted, and Thor backed off all nice_

_Then that Jotunn-who is a man- came up to Thor one day_

_And then Great Thor he fell in love, and whisked that man away.’_

Wait. What?

.

Odin and Laufey were meeting yet again. This time in a well-known hotel in Midgard, in the conference room. The room looked a bit like a gladiator rink (colosseum) which was fitting given the mood of the room. Laufey was growling, holding up some report or the other… but he also looked triumphant, which was always cause for concern.

“We have the fibre analysis test. Guess what we found. It’s not only Aesir Denim, it’s **_Royal_** Aesir Denim!” Laufey boomed. “One of your ilk killed Angrboda and Loptr!”

“That’s impossible!” It was Thor, wasn’t it? Oh he was going to _give it to that boy!_

“Read it and weep.” Laufey hissed, flinging the report at Odin. He had like 8 copies in his desk alone, he was well-covered.

Odin looked at the report, and sure enough, ‘Royal Aesir Denim’ was the fabric listed as matching the fibre. “Well it wasn’t us.”

“Bah! I am tired of your games old man! Surrender unto us whichever of your sons did this and we will have this whole thing straightened out.” Laufey said ‘whichever’ but they both knew it was Thor.

“Never, fish monger! None of my children would have had the opportunity to do such a thing! And if they had tried, they would have been easily recognised by their clean clothes!”

“Very well, you ludicrous hippy! I have given you many opportunities to come clean and admit where you’ve gone wrong, but I won’t stand for this. Odin Borson, you are officially an enemy of Jotunheim. I declare war.”

“Well good, because I second it.” Odin spat at Laufey’s face.

Laufey wiped it off and smeared it in Odin’s one good eye.

Their guards got both of them out of there before it got ugly.

.

It was their late night meetings, their secret trysts, that were the reason that Thor wasn’t at his apartment when his father arrived there. Naturally his first stop knowing that those fibres **_had_** to have come from Thor’s jeans. There was no way that Baldr, with his catatonic state- and his relative sensibility regardless- could have been behind the gruesome murder of Angrboda and Loptr.

Odin had been knocking for a good thirty minutes before he saw Thor approaching from behind him, a blissed-out look on his face. This did not improve Odin’s mood.

“Father? What’s got you in such a dour state?” Thor asked, unlocking the door and inviting Odin in.

“What. Have. You. Done?” Odin seethed.

“What do you mean?” Oh no, had his father found out? Oh, Thor was going to be in _so much trouble_ if Odin had found out about him and Loki.

“This!” Odin slammed the document into Thor’s face. Thor frowned, rubbing his cheek in pain as he read it. 

“Er… what is this?” Thor asked, genuinely confused. It looked like a lab report.

“It’s a lab report. Fibres from jeans _you wear_ \- and don’t even _try_ to pin it on Baldr, he couldn’t pull off a kidnapping in his state- because they’re made of _Royal_ ** _fucking_** _Aesir Denim_ were found at the scene of Angrboda and Loptr’s kidnapping. So Thor, I’m asking you **_nicely_** : why the **_fuck_** did you do it?” Odin was practically frothing at the mouth. Oh this was bad, so bad, but Thor **_hadn’t done anything_**!

“I’ve done nothing!”

“Then what _were_ you at the time of the crime?” Odin asked in a mocking, joking voice, which only made Thor even more scared.

“That was, what, December 8th or something. I remember coming back from the club and finding out the next day. Father, I couldn’t have done it, I was dancing with- uh, not important.”

“Which. Club?”

“Heven. Angela was bartending that night, I’m sure she could vouch for me.” Odin hated Heven. Aldrif, his daughter, had taken over, sure, but it had still been founded by the mad woman who’d stolen her from them in the first place.

“She’d be lying.” Odin growled.

“No! Heven has CCTV by the front, I’m sure they’ve got it on the tapes!”

Odin still looked furious, but slightly less furious. It was clear that there was an element of distrust, and maybe about a month or two ago that’d make Thor livid… but he could understand why his father wouldn’t trust him, and he didn’t begrudge him that. Honesty likes being questioned, lies don’t. 

“Father. I promise, I’ve never even **_been_** to Jotunheimr, let alone been there to kidnap someone. The only things I’ve done throughout this whole gang war was that fight with Angrboda, and keying Kari’s car after some Jotnar jumped Volstagg.” And I also did your enemy's son, but let’s not talk about that one please. Well, Thor supposed, it wasn’t even that much to talk about. While they’d had plenty of sex, it’d never transpired to intercourse (Thor’d just never wanted it… deep down he knew he couldn’t do such a thing knowing that Loki was still in a relationship with another, dumb as it sounded.

“You keyed Kari’s car?”

“That’s it. And Volstagg is still in hospital, so you cannot condemn me for getting even over a friend. Nobody got hurt this time.”

“Aye.” Odin got up. “We’re putting this building under 24 hour surveillance… you might need to move back home soon. Laufey’s declared a gang war. Nowhere is safe.”

.

It was a weird feeling. Before, there had been fear and everyone had been walking on eggshells, now that a war had been officially declared, despite the knowledge that most of them would likely die, it was still like a collective breath had been let out, like a metaphorical weight had been lifted off of their chests.

Thor and Loki didn’t dare glance at each other in hallways anymore. It was too dangerous, too risky.

Thor had never in his entire life felt so empty on the inside. Jane had tried to flirt with him, but he’d rebuffed it. He was having trouble eating and sleeping, what with all the stress of the current situation, he didn’t have time for a _girlfriend_.

Despite all the warning signs that there’d be a lot of violence coming students’ ways, MU had  stupidly decided to stay open. A man had gotten necklaced as a result. They still stayed open. It was a shit show.

People moved carefully and in large groups. Thor would laugh at their fear if he didn’t fear it himself. Clubs never met up anymore. The atmosphere was so tense. It was no wonder that Thor woke up one night to find Loki in his room.

“How’d you get in?” Odin had installed extra security.

“I dressed up as ‘ _Loka_ ’, they must’ve recognised me,” Loki joked, sitting down on Thor’s bed and laying back up against him. “This whole thing’s such a mess.”

“I know,” Thor wound an arm around Loki and breathed him in subtly. He’d missed the other man’s touch.

They wound up with their pants down. They didn’t typically remove shirts. Every gang had a tattoo, they didn’t want to be reminded of the divisions that laid between them- especially Loki, wasn’t it bad enough that he was engaging in this despicable act which his body seemed to crave? Thor sucked Loki’s cock then rutted against him till they both blew their loads. 

“This whole thing is so scary.” Loki finally said. “I have a whole new appreciation for my father’s war stories.”

“Same. Did you hear? A bunch of Light Elves ganged up on a Vanir and strung him up and killed him.”

“A Vanir man dismembered a Jotunn child and left their pieces around town for everyone to see.”

“Sometimes I wish that it didn’t have to be like this.”

“Same…”

“Not just the wars, but this whole thing entirely…” Thor mumbled, restraint missing from his tongue. He blamed it on the fact that Loki was agreeing with him, which in and of itself was a rather unusual phenomenon. He blamed it on so many things, especially their late night strolls which had been pushing the thought further and further to the front of his mind. “Sometimes I wish that we didn’t have to hide.” He twirled a lock of Loki’s hair in his fingers, absentmindedly. “I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you in this war, Loki… I love you.” He sounded miserable, he knew, but he had every right to sound exactly how he felt. Fuck being fake, this was his bedroom, dammit.

Loki stiffened. “You must be mistaken.” Loki knew for a fact that those feelings were not reciprocated.

“No. I mean it, I really do. I love you.” Thor huffed, frustrated. “It’s been bothering me for days now… but I do love you.”

“Tho- **_stop_**!” Loki warned, an uncomfortable, agitated feeling settling over him. Instead of feeling warmth where Thor’s hand was he felt repulsion, abhorrence to the touch. He jerked up and off.

“Loki-” Thor’s bedroom door was slammed shut, and so was his front door. Loki was well and out of there long before Thor even had time to put on some pants.

.

The atmosphere at school was even more hostile. How could it not be when five people in their year had been killed in a ‘car crash’? A car crash involving a soap truck owned by Nidavellir. Their year only had 2800 people, so already that was 1/560 people _dead_! Not injured, **_dead_**! And that wasn’t even including all the people who’d died from other stuff: as previously mentioned, there’d been a _necklacing_ victim!

It didn’t help knowing that the reason Thor and Loki weren’t looking at each other now had a new component: they weren’t talking. Loki had been jolted by Thor’s words, had (Thor could only guess) decided that he was ‘straight again’, and had gone back to being overly affectionate towards Sigyn.

Every kiss, caress and hug felt like a sucker-punch to Thor’s face. He knew he was being a bit overly dramatic. Loki didn’t like women, everything he had with Sigyn was manufactured. And still it hurt him like nothing else.

He hated love. Love sucked. Honestly, fuck love. He’d never had this problem with Amora or Jane! Never felt this strongly about either of them. And yet here he was pining (there, _he said it!)_ like some lovesick fool over a weird, snarky, rude, condescending, closeted gay-kid

Volstagg was getting discharged that night. They’d ran scan after scan on him, and his brain was doing fine despite the head trauma from the bar or bat or whatever- that bit was literally the least relevant thing about the attack. Thor was going to go and pick him up later at night with Sif, Fandral, and Hogun. They’d begged Volstagg’s parents for permission. His mother had always had a soft spot for Thor because of that time he’d stood up for his overweight friend in kindergarten. 

.

Thor was lacing up his shoes, ready to head out to go and grab Volstagg. Fandral would be coming in about half an hour and then they’d go ahead and leave together. Good thing he was running early (don’t blame Thor, he was excited), because he heard a ring on his doorbell.

He walked over and opened the door.

_Angela_! His face widened into a smile. “Hey sis, what can I do you for?”

“Thor, I need to tell you something. We need to go inside.” She seemed urgent. Thor obliged her request, letting the bushy, red-haired girl in the cap and jacket in. Whatever it was must have been important because she’d risked Heven’s seeming ‘neutrality’ to come and communicate with her brother, which meant that her business might take a nose-dive. And everyone knew how Angela felt about her business.

“What’s going on?”

“I was at the club the other day, bartending, and I overheard these men talking. They mentioned something about Asgard and Jotunheimr… they seemed like they were conspiring.”

“Did you get a good look at them?”

“Yeah, I also got a photo.” She showed him the photo on her phone. “Thor, something’s not right. I heard them talking, I think someone mentioned something about someone ‘never suspecting them’… I think they were conspiring.”

“You mean that you think that an attack is going to be launched against one of us?”

“Possibly, though I can’t be sure.”

“Well, we’re in the middle of a war, sis. That’s going to happen anyways.”

Angela shook her head. “That’s just the thing, brother. They were talking about this **_before_** the war was announced… as though they knew it was coming.”

Huh… well that _was_ odd. “Thank you for the intel… if they come back, please see if you can find out more.”

“Of course… brother, you do not look well.” Thor supposed one might look that way when sleep had been hard won and the most they’d eaten for a meal all week had been half a pack of crackers. 

“Oh it’s nothing, just the war and stuff.” He waved a hand to dismiss her concerns. But she wasn’t giving up without a fight.

“And stuff?” Angela raised a brow. “This has nothing to do with that Jotunn boy you keep harassing in my club, does it?”

“No.” Thor blushed. Drat.

“ _Thor_ …”

“Fine, _yes_.” Thor shook his head. “It felt like we were getting somewhere, really, it did. After months of mindless hookups, I start catching feelings for him. I tell him about these feelings and-”

“And he doesn’t feel the same way?”

“Yeah.”

Angela bit her lip. “I know this is going to sound dumb… but I’ve seen the way he looks at you too. I wouldn’t get too caught up on this.”

“Yeah?”

“It’s only a matter of time.” She kissed her brother’s hair. It was rare that she showed affection…

But when the little idiot needed, she wouldn’t hesitate.

.

Jarnsaxa walked about his room, turning and looking at himself in the mirror. He was wearing a dress. His mother’s dress.

Oh, this felt so right. He felt so free. He daydreamed. In his daydreams she was a she. She was free to be a she. But in the real world she could not be a she, because it was unnatural and abhorrent and… and because there was no place for people like her in the real world… was there?

Jarnsaxa took off the dress, quickly. He couldn’t let anyone see him in this dress. He’d be murdered, just like Cecilia Lim had been the previous week when they’d deemed her too ‘masculine’.

‘Him’ because he was a **_he_** , not a ‘she’. Him because he was a good, strong boy, and because he owed his mother a normal child. He **_had_** to be a normal child. He’d heard his father screaming it as his mother prior to their divorce, he knew he was the reason for it. The crux of it all, he thought, had been when Kari had seen him braiding his nails back when they were both children and had reported it to his father, who’d beaten Jarnsaxa to near death.

He owed this to his mother. He did, he did, **_he_** did!

Jarnsaxa. Was. A. He.

.

Baldr laid back on the couch eating chips. He wiped the crumbs off on his shirt and frowned. There were now _more_ crumbs on his shirt. He looked down. Oh, he’d run out of clean shirt. He knew he should’ve changed shirts two days ago. He hummed, then lifted up the bottom hem of the shirt and wiped the cheesy-crust on his belly. There was a chocolate stain at the bottom of his shirt that was gathering ants.

Oh well, he’d change it tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was a bit hard to write, but the reason I stuck with 'he' for Jarnsaxa is because even though she wants to be a 'she', she's thinking of herself as a 'he' because she's denying that she's trans.


	27. Break it down, ayo, ayo, c’mon, ayo

Loki was leaving school when he saw Angrboda and Svadilfari engaged in what appeared to be the beginnings of a fight. The four other men looked poor… probably Dark Elves. They were the ones that lived in poverty, weren’t they?

“Hey, hey, what’s going on here?” Loki butted in.

“These Dark Elves over here were trying to get funny with us.” Svadilfari started.

“They were trying to _mug us,_ the little upstarts.” Angrboda growled.

“Talking about how we were gonna be ‘cockroaches under their boots.” Svadilfari added.

“Well ignore them, there’s enough senseless violence these days as is.” Loki said.

“Yeah, go back and run off to your mommies you crybabies!” Those fucking Dark Elves were not helping. Svadilfari lunged and the situation quickly escalated into a full-on brawl.

Loki whipped out his knife and stabbed it into somebody’s arm.

A shot went off. Then another. Loki felt a pain take hold of his chest.

“Loki!” He heard someone shout as the cowardly Dark Elves sped off and police started arriving. The person turned out to be Angrboda, he figured, because the next words were “Svad! Svad! Call an ambulance!” Angrboda clutched onto Loki. Loki took deep, gulping breaths, but they hurt _so much!_

Angrboda ripped off his jacket and tied it around Loki in a feeble attempt to stop the bleeding. My, there was an awful lot of blood, wasn’t there? Realising that it was too big and baggy, he ripped off his own shirt and turned it into rags, tying them around Loki, crimson staining white. Well… it was getting darker than crimson, and that was **_not_** a good sign!

The ambulance was there in five minutes. They rushed Loki into it and immediately started treating him. Angrboda and Svadilfari quickly set off, ignoring their own wounds. A police officer told them that they’d (the ambulance would) be going to Sinai, so they hopped off to follow the ambulance.

.

It was by chance, truly, that just as Thor was celebrating the discharge of his best-friend in the whole world (well, one of them), _just as_ Thor and his merry gang of friends had reached the ground floor and were about to make their way out of the hospital (Fandral wanted something from the vending machine), a group of nurses were rushing past them with a patient towards the ICU. 

Thor figured that it was probably some poor, unfortunate soul who’d been caught up in the gang wars, so he (out of curiosity) looked over, and his heart stopped. “Loki.” He breathed.

Loki was lying on the gurney, tubes in his mouth and a panicked but sleepy expression on his face. Moments afterwards came rushing through Angrboda and Svadilfari, both frantic. Thor was still standing frozen where he’d been, Sif asking him what was wrong, an oblivious Fandral walking back with a KitKat and a smile.

“What happened.” Thor asked as Angrboda and Svadilfari rushed past him.

“None of your business, spawn of Odin.” Would have been Svadilfari’s answer, if a still in shock (and still shirtless) Angrboda hadn’t beaten him to the punch.

“Dark Elves… fight… Loki.” Thor thought it was interesting that despite the evident toxic masculinity displayed by Jotnar ( _how long_ had it taken Loki to open up and talk more about Byleistr’s death in a less than mechanical way, huh? How bitter had Loki looked while crying about the death of his brother- not sad, **_bitter_** , like he was disappointed he couldn’t keep it in. Thor had seen him trying to wipe the evidence off his face so many times in the hopes that Thor wouldn’t notice.) Angrboda was clearly about to have a big emotional breakdown. 

Sif thought it was funny that Thor could look so pensive when his eyes were full of tears. 

Fandral thought it was funny that Sif thought it was funny that Thor thought it was interesting that Angrboda was distraught over Loki’s injury. Wait, Loki was here?

Within minutes, Helblindi had arrived. They needed a blood transfusion, from what Thor could hear with his eavesdropping. Loki had a rare blood type, so they’d need blood from Helblindi.

And Thor? Thor would need blood from elsewhere.

.

The sound of a motorbike filled the streets of Svartalfheim. Which was odd in and of itself because not many people owned vehicles there, and **_nobody_** owned a motorbike.

Thor hopped off, revenge on his mind.

‘ _I don’t know what I’d if something happened to you in this war_ ,’ well, Thor supposed, cocking his gun and knife. This was the perfect time to find out.

“Hey little boy, you look lost.” Crooned a particularly vicious-looking thug. He had a scar down one side of his face and wore a beanie and some raggedy coat-looking thing.

“Hey there, pretty boy! Nice bike, can I take her for a spin?” Came another voice, a dirty man with hair so clotted it hung together like dreadlocks.

Another man approached, this one had blood on his hands, like he’d recently been in a fight. He was young, somewhat. Rat-faced and all. He had a gun, Thor realised. He pointed the gun at Thor, and fired, Thor dodged and shot at him himself, shooting the gun right out of his hands.

The man with the scar shouted and jumped at Thor, his hands raised like claws. It was clear that his objective was to disarm Thor. Unlike in movies, where only one person attacks the hero at a time, the other two also pounced on Thor to disarm him. He kicked and screamed and clawed and scratched, but they got his gun and started to trample him. 

He whipped out his knife and stabbed a man in the foot.

In times of past the Vikings had tales of tribes known as ‘Berserkers’. These people would clothe themselves in animal skins and bathe themselves in the blood of their enemies, howling into the moon at their pleasure. In that moment, it was like Thor had become one of those legendary peoples. 

He sliced away at his attackers, filling the muddy, dirty, vomit-inducing streets of Svartalfheim with blood. Painting the cracked tar roads red to match the feeling in Thor’s head. His blade was alive, truly. Slicing away so quickly and suddenly, stabbing with such finesse that Thor didn’t even noticed how the blade would slip under its bloody lubrication and slice open his hand as well. Guess there were two possible interpretations of being ‘caught red handed’.

A woman saw the carnage and screamed. This, coupled with the other mens’ dying, pained moans and shouts, had naturally attracted the attention of the community at large.

Thor spat at their bodies and kicked them around for good measure, then got on his motorbike and drove off.


	28. Let’s go (Ooh) yeah sing it to me baby in my head right now

When the high of his murder spree had ended, Thor was left in shock.

He’d washed his hands, but naturally there were cuts and scrapes and bruises all over them still. Oh Norns, what had he done!?

_That boy- that boy had shot at him first! How else was he supposed to react!?_

**_Well why had he even gone there in the fucking first place!?_ **

For Loki. Thor gritted his teeth. Every time he imagined Loki on that stretcher, so lifeless, oxygen tubes strapped up to his mouth…  **_urgh_ ** , he just wanted to destroy this whole damned world.

He’d meant what he’d said, back when he’d first met Loki. Loki wasn’t cut out for the gang life… he wasn’t a piece of shit like the rest of the gangbangers… he was worth something, he deserved better. **_And Thor wanted to give him better_**! But if Thor went back to Sinai, he’d be sure to find Loki dead. He might as well just stick a bullet in his own head, at least then he’d be with Loki again. Norns- _why was this world so unfair!?_

Fandral knocked on the bathroom door. “Hey, Thor, buddy. You in there? We need to talk.” 

“About?” Oh Norns, could Thor _sound_ more guilty?

“The hospital.” Thor opened the door. Fandral saw his hands and winced. “Oh bud, what happened to you?”

“I got into a fight.”

“Over Loki?” Fandral implored, searching Thor’s panicked eyes. “I guessed when I saw what transpired at the hospital… Sif filled me in on the rest, told me I couldn’t tell anyone. Hey bud, I’m so sorry about what you’re going through.” Fandral hugged Thor. Thor hugged him back.

The bromance was real.

“Fandral I’m so scared.”

“Well you shouldn’t be. We hung out around the hospital afterwards. They’ve got him on the rocks, I’m sure he’ll get better.”

“Do you know where the bullet hit him?”

“Somewhere along his chest- but not along his heart, don’t worry! I checked on that.”

“Do you know if it hit his lungs?”

“No Thor, I’m sorry.” His best friend said in a way that implied that he hated himself for not asking.

“Thank you so much, Fandral. You’re literally the best.”

“No problem.”

.

As a nice change of pace: instead of Loki breaking in to visit Thor, Thor had broken in to visit Loki.

He’d waited two full weeks for Loki to recover somewhat, then disguised himself as the World’s Sexiest Janitor, and looked around until he’d found Loki’s room.

Loki was lying in a room on his own, still recovering from surgery wherein they’d removed the bullet. He got **_huge_** doses of pain meds daily, but was on the road to recovery. He’d woken up and bit by bit they’d been trying to get his consciousness levels back to normal. It would probably take a few weeks for him to be ‘good as new’ but from what Thor’d read on his medical report (Hogun was an expert hacker. God it felt good having his friends knowing. He should’ve known they’d be supportive of the relationship) he’d be discharged sometime in the following week.

“Thor?” Loki asked, shifting a little when he saw the blond man enter the room.

“Loki.” Thor breathed, a sigh of relief at seeing the other male alive and, well, not **_well_** -well, but on the road to recovery. Thor strode forwards and planted a kiss upon Loki’s lips. Loki kissed him back. “What happened?”

“We were in a fight,” Loki gestured, his arms flopping about lazily. “And then someone shot a bullet at me and it hit my chest- but it only **_just_** grazed my lungs. I lost a lot of blood so ‘Blindi had to donate some to me. Don’t worry, I’ll be out in a few More days.”

Thor nodded. “Glad to hear… Loki, I did something bad.”

“Thor… I read in the paper yesterday that three Dark Elves were found murdered.” Loki struggled but sat up. “Did you-?” Thor dipped his head down. “Oh, Thor… crap…”

“I know.”

“How did your father take it?”

“He doesn’t know.”

“Doesn’t know? There were eyewitnesses-”

“Who can’t seem to string together a story of what happened… but my blood’s in there, alright.” Thor sighed in dismay.

Loki bit his lip. “I hope you didn’t… I hope you didn’t kill them on my behalf.”

“No- I- er.”

“Oh, Thor.” Loki laid a hand on Thor’s neck. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know, it’s just… I don’t know. I saw you on that stretcher, and you looked… dead.” That was the only word to describe it, really. 

“You must’ve been scared…” Loki acknowledged.

“That’s one word for it. I wasn’t thinking, I just raced in there and…” he shrugged.

“It is what it is… this is just the kind of life we lead… Thor, I hope you’re not too hung up over it.”

“Wouldn’t you be if you killed three people in cold blood?”

“It’s **_hot_** blood when you’re fuelled by rage, in the moment.” Loki corrected, and then his voice went small. “And I don’t know… what I’d do if you… you know, if you got hurt.” He avoided saying the word ‘killed’. “What I do know is that it’s not your fault… I don’t imagine that you both drove there _and_ started the fight with some random civilians. That doesn’t seem like your M.O.”

“No, a rat-faced kid shot at me so I shot back… but I did still go in there _looking_ for a fight. And the way I sliced them up into smithereens and felt nothing. Loki it was so intense and yet I wasn’t even concentrating.”

“My big, strong hero…” Loki whispered.

“Loki, this is not the time for jokes.”

“Who’s joking? You took on three men in a fight and won. I think that’s cause for celebration.” Loki’s hand moved to Thor’s pants, but Thor saw Loki wincing in pain when he’d leant over and shook off Loki’s hand.

“You’re too weak for this… we’ll do it after you’re healed.

“Alright… Thor, what’re we going to do?”

“About?”

“About this. About the Svartalfheim murders.”

“ ** _We_** don’t need to do anything. I am at fault here.”

Loki shook his head. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You acted in rage, Thor. I’ve done worse things while I was calm.”

“Oh?”

“Did I ever tell you about the time By- er, you know, my brother took me out on my first gang mission? I shot a hole into like seven people. I was nine at the time.” They didn’t **_die_** , but yeah, he’d shot them.

“That’s fucked up.”

“Our lives are fucked up. Pass the nuts on my footboard, will you? And fluff my pillow.”

“Aye aye, captain.” Ten minutes into confessing over a mass murder and he was already feeling a bit better. Loki really was a Norns’ send. He couldn’t believe he’d almost lost the little angel that was currently kissing his hands better. He started sobbing. He’d almost lost Loki.

He’d almost lost _Loki_. 

.

“What’s going on?” Thor asked Sif, watching as police men came and took Angrboda away in handcuffs.

“He’s wanted in connection for the murder of those three men.” Sif whispered low. Thor gulped. He’d told nobody, on his side at least, and though he hated Angrboda with a passion, he couldn’t let them indict him for something he hadn’t done.

“Wasn’t he at the hospital that whole night? And the night after? And the night after?” Thor’d got that much from the visitor logs.

“You’re right… they’ll rule him out, I’m sure. Who do you think it was?” Me. 

“No clue.” Thor said, though the red marks on his skin from where he’d scratched himself every time the guilt became overbearing disagreed with him. Not harmful scratches, really, just a little nervous itch was all. He’d be fine.

.

Thor’s arms had been on fire for weeks. Fuck this, they’d catch him eventually, he was certain. Angrboda’d been released when, as Sif’d said, they’d ruled him out based on the visitor logs. Also, there’d been reports of a blond at the scene of the crime, a big, burly one. The suspicion had fallen onto the Jotnar because of Loki’s attack, but it’d stated coming right back for Thor. Blond hair wasn’t commonplace amongst the Jotnar, at least not amongst the elites, and it wasn’t like the 'common folk' would’ve known by then what had happened to one of their ‘princes’ 

Thor rang up Odin on his phone.

“Father, I did it.” Thor confessed. “I killed those three men.”


	29. Ayo, ayo, c’mon yeah, ayo

“You’ve done… **_what?_** ” Odin’s voice wasn’t a shout, and that was probably the scariest bit of it all.

“I killed them.” Thor confessed.

“Do you know… how much of a mess you have made?” Somehow it was scarier having this conversation over the phone.

“Father, I’m sorry. One of them shot at me and I fired back and things escalated- I flew into a rage and I was already home by the time I’d snapped out of it.”

“Oh Thor, there is going to be **_hell_** to pay for this!” Odin snapped.

.

Thor was under House Arrest. It was like jail, but Thor was supposed to appreciate it more, he guessed. Odin had brought him back home, screamed at him some, tagged him like an animal, and decreed that Thor wasn’t to be leaving the house for the foreseeable future.

Frigga had come to Thor and asked him the simple question: “Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“Half-assed excuses may work on your father, but they won’t on me.”

Thor bit his lip. “You promise not to tell **_anyone_**?”

“Pinky swear.” Frigga held out her pinky, Thor crossed it. It was like he was five again and his mother was promising not to tell his father that he’d taken the Range Rover out for a joyride.

“I’ve… been seeing someone. Uh, when we were with Volstagg, taking him home, I saw them rush that person in… and they looked dead. I don’t know, I guess deep down I’d harboured fears about them dying in this gang war… there’s always something to be worried about when it comes to them, I guess.” Thor huffed a half-assed laugh. “I got told a Dark Elf shot them, so I went to Svartalfheim, admittedly looking for a fight, and then there were these three elves and one of them shot at me and I shot back and then they disarmed me but I still had my knife and I fought back and well, you know what happened.”

Frigga’s jaw had dropped about a minute into the story. “ ** _Loki_** **_Laufeyson_ ** !?” She had hissed. “Boy, are you _insane_?” 

“I didn’t say it was Loki!” Thor insisted.

“Well who else was it going to be? There’s only been one high-profile shooting of someone by a Dark Elf.” Frigga started cursing then. Not in english, but rather in old norse. “Thor, if your father finds out you are **_dead_** \- you and your brother, I swear!” She started muttering nonsensically.

“Please don’t tell him!” Thor begged.

“I won’t, but good luck trying to explain exactly what happened without mentioning it.” Frigga warned him. She got up and left while muttering about how ‘dense’ and ‘cock-led’ the men in their family were. Odd.

.

Okay, this was just getting ridiculous. He’d left Baldr alone now **_two_** months ago! he was still the same as he’d been back then- heck he was the same as he’d been back in September!

“Baldr, what’s going on with you?” Thor asked.

“Wha-?” Baldr looked up at him with wide, frozen eyes. How long’d he been on his phone?

“What’s happening? You’ve been like this for months! Are you on drugs or something?” Thor asked, suspiciously.

“No, I-”

“Are you forming a new gang?”

“No-”

“Are you de-”

“Thor! Will you _stop! Talking!_ ” Baldr snapped. “I’m having a mid-life crisis and your _incessant talking_ isn’t helping!”

“You’re 19!”

“You don’t know how long I’m going to live!”

“Baldr-”

“I’m seeing someone.” Baldr said, abruptly, unwilling to listen to any more of Thor’s speculations.

“Who?”

“You can’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t.”

“Karnilla.”

Thor nearly spat out his- wait, he wasn’t eating. Thor nearly jumped off of his seat. “ _Bus Bomb Karnilla? Has a_ ** _warrant_** _out for her arrest, Karnilla? Got expelled last month from MU after they tracked that bomb back to her definitively, Karnilla?”_

_“_ Aye. I’ve been thinking of running away with her- I almost did last week, mother caught me.” Instead of condemning Baldr for such an action, like he was _certain_ that their mother had done, Thor just shook his head and sighed.

“Mother’s right, we’re both fucked.”

“Oh don’t worry, brother. I’m sure Loki’ll come around.”

“What? How did you know?”

“Who doesn’t?”

“That’s not providing me with reassurance, Baldr. If any Jotunn finds out Loki’s dead.”

“I heard mother screaming and inferred.” Baldr sighed in admittance. “Don’t worry, Thor. With the wide berth you two’ve been giving each other at school there’s no way anybody knows.”

“Norns, I hope so.”

.

“Oh, Loki.” Sigyn enveloped him in her arms as soon as he got into his home. His father hadn’t been to see him the entire time, which was predictable. Helblindi’d been glued there the first week alongside Sigyn and, unfortunately, ‘Boda.

Don’t get Loki wrong. He liked spending time with ‘Boda. But with ‘Boda came **_her_** , and Loki did **_not_** like  **_her_ ** . Apparently kindness came from Sigyn’s mother’s side because Skadi was a right **_bitch_**.

Imagine making fun of someone who’d almost died. He’d smirked when Angrboda had told Skadi to just go ahead and get the fuck out. He was a petty bitch, so what?

“Don’t worry, dear, I’m alright.” And I come with big news. God he hopes she wasn’t disappointed.

“I’m glad you’re feeling better… but you’ll feel _even better_ when we’re at the holiday house in Vanaheim.” She giggled, moving her hand to his crotch, digging her lips into his neck.

“Sigyn. I’m breaking up with you.”

It was so silent you could have heard a pin drop.

“What?” She said finally, clearly still in shock.

“I’m sorry, but… I need to break up with you.” He said, slower.

“Why?” 

“I just- I’ve been doing some thinking and I think… things’ve been moving a bit fast, I guess. I need some time to figure myself out.”

“We can take it slower.” Loki shook his head.

“Sigyn, I still love you, but you deserve to be with someone who loves you a heck of a lot more than I do. We need this, it’s best for the both of us, really.” He said. 

“No, no,” she was mumbling, tears in her eyes. He hated seeing her like this.

“Sorry, Sigs.” But she was shaking her head and screaming and mumbling as she walked out of the entryway and left the house.

And, guilty as he felt, it was like a ginormous weight had been lifted off of his chest. Bullet not included, that one had been removed by a skilled team of surgeons and had cost about 10 gold pieces.

And Loki knew exactly where he’d be heading next.


	30. She’ll be screaming out when it all goes down

Loki was where Loki always was, Thor was coming to realise: in Thor’s bedroom. Somehow though, it still surprised him.

“Loki?” Thor gaped at the sight of the other man standing right beside an open window which Thor didn’t remember opening. 

“Thor.” Loki nodded in greeting, arms folded over his chest, leaning back all relaxed.

“Oh, you idiot,” Thor rushed towards the window and closed it before assessing Loki’s state. “You shouldn’t have done something so strenuous while still recovering from a bullet wound!”

“The doctor in you is really showing, Odinson.” Loki smirked sadly.

“Well, what was so important that you had to risk being murdered to come and pay a visit?”

“I broke up with Sigyn.” Loki said. Thor’s eyes widened.

“ _What_!?”

“Well, it didn’t seem fair to her to stay in a relationship, acting like she was my backup when I knew for a fact that it would never be like that. Getting shot changes you, I suppose.”

“Oh, you don’t say.”

Loki smiled. “I see you’ve internalised my sarcasm.”

“Hard not to when it **_oozes_** off of you.” Thor smiled nostalgically.

Loki initiated the kiss this time. It was a fairly rare phenomenon, for Loki to start one. The total number of times he’d started one were two now: their first kiss and now this.

Thor’s hand fell to Loki’s waist as Loki started unzipping Thor. Thor proceeded to shove Loki’s own pants down. Loki slid his fingers under Thor’s t-shirt and indicated that he wanted to take it off. Well, this was rare, they didn’t usually strip naked, neither wanting to see the other’s tattoos, but Thor obliged regardless. Beneath Thor’s t-shirt lay a tattoo of a hammer with lightning (the mythical hammer Mjolnir with the Thunder God Thor’s lightning around it), it sat on his left pectoral, above his heart. Thor moved to remove Loki’s shirt off of him (he hadn’t worn his jacket, which had been a smart move because some Asgardian would surely have killed him). Beneath Loki’s shirt was a bandage wrapping, which Thor traced.

“Don’t worry. It’s mostly healed. Just a bit of tender skin under there.” Loki said, minimising the extent to which his skin had been damaged. He didn’t mention the stitches or the bullet-shaped hole and incision marks which the doctors said would probably scar. “Doctor said the bullet didn’t hurt my lung- but apparently my smoking has.” The doctor had said he’d have six years to live if he kept smoking the way he did. Silly doctor, _cigarettes_ weren’t what’d get him. He’d be long dead by then.

“Who would have thought?” Thor joked.

“I’m starting to miss earnest, thoughtless Thor.” Loki kissed along Thor’s jaw.

“Well, I’m **_definitely_** not missing shy!Loki.” Thor ground his hips against Loki’s.

This time was like all the others, except not at all. They were both clearly going to engage in sex, but this time felt… different. Thor blamed it on the lack of guilt over Sigyn. They started off the same: Thor over Loki, grinding down on him, Thor giving Loki a hand job, but that was where the similarities all ended.

Thor got down onto the bottom end of the bed and swiped his tongue over Loki’s hole, claiming that he ‘just wanted to try something’. Something he’d tried on other partners, with good reviews across the board. Loki seemed to quite enjoy it too, panting and moaning over Thor like a bitch in heat. Norns, where had he gotten that thought from?

And so he’d slipped in a finger. Then two, then three. (‘What’s that!?’ ‘That’s your prostate, Loki!’) Loki’s cock was beading, and Thor leant up to lick the little drop from the tip.

As Thor moved up, Loki grasped his hand, holding it where it was inside of him. “Fuck me.”

And Thor was supposed to say what: no? 

Thor knew he had no STIs because he’d taken a test after the last person he’d slept with (Amora). He also figured that Loki had no STIs because it was just him and Sigyn, and Thor couldn’t even be too sure that they’d slept together in recent history. Still, out of habit and not wanting to take a chance, Thor slipped himself into a condom, making sure to leave that little bubble-type-bit at the end so that his cum would have room to fill.

He lubed himself up with some KY, and entered Loki slowly.

He’d dreamed of this. Thought about it a lot. In most of his fantasies he was taking Loki in a hotel, and Loki was writhing and moaning and tossing about. But his parents were fucking downstairs and Baldr was **_upstairs_** , and-

Back In Black started playing. Super loud. From Baldr’s room. It was like the Norns **_wanted_** him to have amazingly hot sex with Loki.

Thor waited for Loki to adjust before he started thrusting. He kept the thrusts **_slow_** and long. This was Loki’s first time and it was no doubt somewhat uncomfortable for him. He hit Loki’s prostate, causing the younger male to judder, and made sure to aim his thrusts for that relative spot.

Loki was hard, Thor could tell. Thor shifted their position so that he was lying down on his side and Loki was slightly in front of him. From here, Thor could see Loki’s gang tattoo on his back: a wolf with a snake around its neck (Fenrir and Jormungadr). He held Loki’s legs apart a little with one hand and kept the other one propped beneath his head. Oh, this position was nice. He couldn’t _see_ Loki’s face, but he could hear him loud and clear, and he could feel every tremble of his body. Unfortunately though, he couldn’t thrust very deeply, and so he had to keep his thrusts short and shallow.

Loki’s little pants and wheezes were like music to Thor’s ears. He sped his thrusts up a little, sucking on Loki’s neck like his blood was the Elixir of Immortality- and in that moment it might as well have been. Loki relaxed into his touch, curling into it, almost. Thor kissed Loki’s cheek before flipping them over once more.

Thor got up in front of Loki and pushed the other man’s legs into his chest- not his upper chest where the bandage lay though. Thor was being careful about that bit. He cradled his arms on either side of Loki, momentarily, staring into the other man’s soul as he cradled the most precious thing in his world between his strong arms. Almost like he was swearing an oath to him that he wouldn’t let anyone hurt him, not even Thor himself. Thor then knelt up in front of Loki and slid back into his hole, moaning at the tight, welcoming clench around the base of his dick. He leaned over in front of Loki, one arm on the headrest, the other pinning Loki’s legs to his chest, and dove right back into Loki’s little hole.

He sped up his thrusts, relishing how easy the angle made it to hit Loki’s prostate. Loki’s moans and cries were so loud he wouldn’t be surprised if his family heard it even over Baldr’s music- _In My Head_ was playing. Oh, Baldr was also having his nostalgic 2010s phase. That was cute! 

Thor poured his heart and soul into the pounding that he was giving Loki. Pushing so hard and far up into Loki that it was like Thor’s hips and Loki’s buttocks were connected. Loki was rock hard as he panted ‘ _Thor, Thor, Thor_ ,’ like music to Thor’s ears.

“Touch yourself,” Thor groaned, pushing on harder. Loki’s hand moved to his dick and pumped it.

“I’m so close.” He gasped.

“Good.” Thor leant forwards and kissed him some, licking at the tears forming under his eyes from how hard he was shutting them on account of the new sensations his body was experiencing. Norns, this was **_so good_**! “Cum for me. Spray yourself over my belly.” Thor whispered into Loki’s ear, grabbing Loki’s cock in his own, rough hand and jerking him off until he came with a squeal and a shout of ‘Oh, _Thor_!’

“Loki.” Thor grunted, his thrusts short and rapid, like a choo-choo train almost. He spilled inside Loki. Well, inside the condom, but the condom was still inside Loki. The sensation of Loki’s walls contracting around him was intense, he pulled out before he could get hard again.

He fell down half-on Loki, exhausted. He took off his condom with practiced ease and threw it into trash like the champion chucker he was.

“That was…” Loki said, breathless.

Thor gave him a quick kiss in an attempt to show him how _he_ felt. He didn’t even care about the cum drying on his stomach. He shifted a pillow and made himself a little more comfortable. Whatever issues he had to deal with in regards to cleaning up this mess could be dealt with in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I *had* to have Loki and Thor's first round of sexual intercourse happen on these lyrics. I *HAD TO!*


	31. Just leave with me now, say the word and we’ll go

When Loki woke up in the morning, he stretched (ignored how cute and soft Thor looked while he slept), crept out of the bed, went over to Thor’s balcony (it was, thankfully, in a private area. Nobody could see him) lit a cigarette and blew out a puff. What now?

It was nice weather, Loki reasoned. Somewhat cold- but he liked the cold, most Jotnar did- cloudy, grey. It was probably going to rain at some point. They lived in the southern hemisphere, and it was February, so there was no chance of it being snow. The clouds swirled up above, a bit like one of those velvety fabrics being moved around. Was it velvet? That shiny stuff that felt okay one way but not okay the other way. That stuff. It looked kind of like that stuff.

He heard some sheets rustling, and sure enough Thor joined him seconds later. “It’s chilly outside.” He tossed Loki Loki’s shirt. Loki unbuttoned it and shrugged it on, buttoning it right back up. Thor looked at Loki, and Loki could tell that the bigger male was judging him. Thor leant over the railing, looking around. “You know, cigarettes are bad for you.”

“I know.”

“Got any extras?”

Loki fished in his pants pocket for his pack and handed it over to Thor with a lighter. “Never pegged you as the smoking time.”

“Oh, you know me: drugs, booze, sex. I’m _Life of the Party Odinson_.” Thor winked, tiredly.

“What time is it?”

“5.” He didn’t need to add ‘AM’ because it obviously wasn’t sunset.

“This whole situation is so messed up.”

“You’re telling me.” Thor snorted. “I can’t imagine Sigyn took your break-up too kindly.”

“Not at all. I wouldn’t be surprised to find her waiting in my bedroom right now for me to come back so that we can ‘talk’.”

“What a shame… she’ll be alright though?”

“Yeah. Svad likes her.” Loki smiled, bitterly. “It wasn’t a good idea to stay together when we’d both be happier with someone else.”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve gotta get home or Laufey’ll notice, or?” Thor tensed up, not wanting Loki to leave, but also not wanting the striking young man to be killed because they got careless one time.

“Nah. I’ll say I went to a club and met a nice lady. You don’t mind, do you?” Loki smirked.

“No. All my friends think I’m a rather dashing lady.”

“Oh?”

“Full bust and everything.” This was so silly, but it still put a smile on Loki’s face.

Thor didn’t ask about Loki’s reaction to the statement he’d made before the shooting. The statement about Loving Loki. He didn’t want to freak the other male out right now. And Loki didn’t say anything about it either, because what was he even _supposed to say?_

~~ I love you too, Thor? I broke up with Sigyn because I realised, despicable as it is, that I love you too? ~~

.

The thing about being under house arrest was that Thor wasn’t allowed to go to university anymore. He hadn’t been expelled- nobody knew who had killed those three Dark Elves, and to be quite honest there were more serious crimes for the police squad to be solving what with the _gang wars_ and all- but Odin had asked for Thor to take distance learning classes, citing that it was simply too dangerous for his son and heir to be travelling into lands where other gang members were. The university, which had taken a lot of money from Asgard in the past, happily obliged that request.

It was still harrowing to learn, however, that the Dark Elves had found out and that Malekith had demanded Thor’s head as recompense for the death of his nephew. When looking at a photo of said nephew, Angrboda had widened his eyes in fury and pointed and shouted. Apparently Ratkeith Smith was the man who had shot Loki that day. 

Loki had made sure to convey the message to Thor between their tumbles in the sheets. Thor had fucked him well and hard for that. It had been glorious. 

Maybe being gay wasn’t so bad. Okay it wasn’t natural, and yes it was perverted, but it wasn’t, like, **_lethal_** , right? So if it wasn’t lethal then maybe it wasn’t the worst thing he could have done. Definitely better than being a transexual or something.

Angrboda was being super clingy ever since the whole bullet incident. He’d taken to tailing Loki everywhere. Always such a good best-friend. Loki, naturally, didn’t bring up the fact that he’d gotten shot trying to de-escalate a fight Angrboda had been involved in. Well, Loki supposed, he’d gotten involved too. Either way, it was nice having his best-friend back, even if the bitch seemed to hate it.

.

Negotiations weren’t going smoothly. Malekith was furious that Thor had dared to enter Dark Elf lands.

Thor supposed that had he left the murdering up to Angrboda, it would have gone down better. After all, Thor couldn’t exactly claim to be exacting revenge when the person he’d killed- Malekith’s nephew- hadn’t shot someone from **_their_** gang, he’d shot someone from a gang that they were at war with.

Laufey had also joined in somewhere. He didn’t know about Thor, thank the Norns, because it wouldn’t have been hard to tie the thread back to Loki. No, thankfully nobody knew about Loki. Thor hadn’t even told Odin. In their family only Frigga and Baldr knew, and he knew they wouldn’t tell a soul… well, they may have told Aunt Freyja, but _to be fair_ she would **_definitely_** have not told a soul. She loved love, but she wasn’t an idiot.

Thor was certain that Laufey wasn’t entering these negotiations because his **_son_** had gotten shot and nearly died, Loki had told him that Laufey hadn’t been to visit him at the hospital, he was sure that the opportunistic fuck just wanted to milk this situation to get Jotunheim some men or some arms or something. He didn’t know **_why_** though, Svartalfheim didn’t exactly have anything to give. Loki and he often gossiped about Laufey’s involvement in the whole thing. 

“I think he wants land.” Loki said. “The Jotnar are notorious for building giant houses-”

“That’s because you’re all so big.” Thor had teased, getting swatted by Loki.

“Nobody heard me the other night?”

“No. There was talk of a few moans, but I told them I’d been watching a porno but couldn’t find my earphones.”

“Good gods.” Loki blushed, mortified.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“We were really that loud? They could hear us over your brother’s music?”

“Apparently.” Thor shrugged. “Don’t worry. They have no reason to suspect us.”

“I hope not.”

.

Loki hopped out of the shower. He’d taken a nice, long, warm one. He didn’t usually take warm showers, they made you happy. He liked cold ones because they kept you alert. One always had to be alert when he was a mob boss’s son. Especially in times of war. The perimeter of Jotunheim had been breached just the day before, 20 people had been killed. There were only 59000 Jotnar. That was almost 1/3000 people dead. For all he knew it could be him killed next- he’d almost been killed- or maybe even Thor. Malekith seemed quite keen to have his head. He’d even had his gang behead a few Aesir and stick their heads on pikes. Not like the police would do anything, they were defunct in this country. And that was assuming that Laufey didn’t clue on to the motives behind Thor’s attack and kill them both first.

Loki hummed. It didn’t have to be like this. This whole ‘gang life’ thing. It didn’t have to exist. In a world with no gangs, none of this violence would be of any great concern- that one two-year-old from yesterday might even still be alive, assuming of course that one did not go by the philosophy of fate and how inevitable it was, i.e. if the kid was destined to die, something would have got her.

He could always run away. Run away with Thor even, maybe. He blinked his eyes. Where would they even run off to? It couldn’t be nearby, couldn’t be anywhere where their families had connections. 

Wow. Look at how much had changed in the span of five months. He’d gone from hating all faggots to becoming one. How the mighty fell, he supposed. And now here he was contemplating the idea of running away with one… he shook his head.

The Jotnar were wrong about the fags. Loki hummed. They weren’t all bad. Thor wasn’t bad. Loki was twisted… but he wouldn’t classify himself as ‘bad’ either.

And that RuPaul? _Loki_ ** _loved_** _him!_


	32. I’ll be your teacher, I’ll show you the ropes

“Another Jotunn attack on SouthSide.” Thor hummed, showing Loki the newspaper. 

“That’s literally impossible, there was a gang meeting last night.” Loki frowned.

“Well, apparently not everyone was in attendance.”

“I did roll-call. We have a population of about 57800, currently, of which around 36000 are eligible to be called upon in times of war. So unless the attackers were old, **_old_** men or weren’t in jackets- because you don’t get those till you’re 18- they weren’t Jotnar. Not everything that transpires against an Asgardian was caused by a Jotunn.” Loki huffed. 

“Well the people there **_saw_** the black leather jackets and confirmed that they spoke with Jotunn accents.” Thor replied.

“Well that’s _impossible_ because everyone was accounted for.”

“Well, Loki, it might surprise you to know that 36000 people are hard to keep track of. And that when you say ‘around’ then you imply that it’s not exact, and that if there were even **_two_** people unaccounted for, they could easily get up to some trouble. Like what happened last night.”

Loki shook his head. “Thor, the gang meeting wasn’t about this bloody war. It was a call to gather for Ymir’s Day. We celebrate the night by drinking rum. You really think people would have skipped that to go and blow up a ship?”

No. Both their gangs descended from vikings. They loved rum.

“Well if not you then who?” He said it with such confidence, though already his mind was drifting back to that conversation he’d had with Angela. _What if?_

Loki shrugged. “I don’t know… we got the results back from the DNA test, it’s not yours.”

“Mine?” When had Thor submitted any DNA?

“Yes. Your father supplied your DNA alongside that of your closest friends- we then threw that away because we couldn’t trust that it was really yours. We took spit samples from drinks and straws you’d thrown away- I helped with a strand of hair-”

“ ** _Loki!_** ”

“Well it wasn’t yours! The denim was undeniably Royal Aesir Denim, but yet the DNA didn’t match yours nor your families.”

“That **_is_** odd.” Thor frowned. Royal Aesir Denim could only be held by a royal. Someone in the direct line of descendants. The club was super exclusive, not even **_Tyr_** owned it, he was out of the running for being a bastard. Angela would have been eligible, but she’d been kidnapped as an infant and, as a member of another gang, had been deemed ‘compromised’, so she was out of the running. Frigga couldn’t own any because she hadn’t been born in Asgard, and also because she wasn’t born a royal. It was only Odin, Thor, and Baldr who owned them.

“I know.” Loki shook his head. “None of this makes any sense… Thor…?” A light switch flicked on in Loki’s brain.

“Yeah?”

“When I got into that fight with the Dark Elves… Svad had said something that implied that the Dark Elves were going to be in charge of all of us.”

“What are you saying?”

“You don’t think that there’s a possibility that they orchestrated all of this… do you?”

“What? Why would they do such a thing?”

“Oh, you know, because a war between the two biggest gangs in Nine would have left us ripe for the taking as soon as we’d decimated each other? Because they have nothing and stealing what we’ve got might work out for them?”

Thor shook his head, unwilling to believe it all. How could they have been duped so? “I mean, it’s a possibility, but Loki I highly doubt it.”

“I’m going to do some digging… I don’t know how they could have gotten the Nemean Leather that we use, nor the Royal Aesir Denim fibres, but I’ll look into it.”

“Alright.”

.

Thor blamed the whole bulletin board that he’d drawn up linking the Dark Elves to each major event on the fact that he was under house arrest and therefore had nothing to do all day.

The evidence that they’d been involved was overwhelming, or at least the circumstantial evidence was.

“Loki?” He said over the phone. 

“Yeah.” The other male replied, connecting one piece of red string from an order that’d been made for Nemean Leather that hadn’t come from the Jotnar to the bakery incident that had occurred just days later.

“Can you get your DNA squad to test the DNA found at the scene on Bonkeith and any friends he may have? I think you’re on to something.”

“Will do.”

.

“What is this?” Odin asked, looking at his frantic son walking in with the oversized-board.

“Father! You are **_not_** going to believe what I have found.” Thor said, solemn-excited. Was that even possible? Well, it was the only way to describe the look on his face: oxymoronic.

“Alright.” Odin’s eye glanced over the board.

.

“And you are **_certain_** that it is the Dark Elves who have caused this?” Laufey looked over the board.

“Positive, father… the only thing is that I can’t quite pin down **_who_** among the Dark Elves orchestrated this. The trail seems to go cold when trying to use facial-recognition to software to identify the men responsible. No school records, no bank records, it’s like these men never existed.”

Laufey nodded. “Malekith must have been planning this for a long time then.”

“Indeed. He would have had to have these kids homeschooled, kept only in Svartalfheim from a young age, no access to the outside world.”

“You’ve done good, Loki.” Laufey nodded. He didn’t call him ‘son’, never did, but Loki didn’t care. “I’ll be taking this to the next meeting.”

“Thank you, father.”

.

Thor’s phone rang. It must be Loki, he’d been planning to also go today to talk to his father about all the links they’d found, all the inconsistencies in the ‘it was Aesir/Jotnar’ theories that could easily be filled with ‘it was a foreign power’. He picked it up and frowned when he saw the name: ‘Amora’.

“Hey? Amora, are you alright?” He asked.

“Just peachy. You free anytime soon, Thor?” She smiled.

“Oh, Amora, I’m under house arrest, remember.” He said, lamely. He didn’t want to be talking to her, to be quite frankly honest.

“Hasn’t stopped us before.”

“Yeah, but it’s dangerous, and I’m busy. Sorry, I’m going to have to rain check any meetings until after this whole gang war is over.”

She sighed on the other end. “Alright, but here’s something to remember me by.” She texted him a picture of her naked body. It was positioned with the camera by her feet as she leant back, legs spread, pussy bared, and tits on full display. Beautiful body as always, and in the past it would have made good ‘wank material’, but Thor deleted it immediately and thanked her with the fakest ‘thank you’ he’d ever pulled off in his life. He didn’t want her nudes, thanks. He didn’t want any nudes… Norns, what had Loki done to him? He used to like naked ladies :( Well, naked bodies in general, but now he thought that nudes were lame and unnecessary. This was so weird!

“Anytime, sweetie. See you soon, I hope.”

Oh, Skuld, _please_ no.


	33. You’ll see a side of love you’ve never known

IN LOKI’S DEFENCE, he’d always **_hated_** the bitch.

So imagine his ‘surprise’ to find the woman his best-friend loved to Hel and back making out with Logi of all people. As in Logi, Angrboda’s family friend. The same Logi Angrboda stuck up for in primary school when he got made fun of for eating paste that one time.

He did what any good friend would do and told Angrboda.

Angrboda didn’t believe him.

“Fine. It’s okay, I get it. I wouldn’t believe me either… would you be willing to participate in a little experiment?” Loki asked.

“Go ahead.”

“We’ll four of us congregate in Hall 3. You’ll say you’re going to drop me home. We’ll walk around the hall and come back around the other side.”

“Fine.” Angrboda looked hesitant, scared. Loki gave him a hug in reassurance.

.

So _of course_ they’d caught them kissing. Making out, Skadi’s hands all over Logi’s. Skadi, like the bitch that Loki had always known her to be, started freaking out and accusing **_Angrboda_** of being a shitty boyfriend- bitch, _he_ didn’t cheat- and said he’d emotionally abused her throughout their relationship (when?) And that **_she_** was breaking up with **_him_**.

Whatever, Angrboda didn’t need that abusive bitch in his life. Loki held an ice-pack to where Skadi’s scratched her nails down the side of Angrboda’s face in rage. If it didn’t stop bleeding soon, they’d go to the hospital.

“I’m sorry, man.” 

“Don’t be… I’m sorry for not believing you.” Oh, Loki hated seeing his oldest friend like this.

“I know what’ll cheer you up. Let’s go go-karting!”

“Loki, you’re still healing.”

“I’ll be fine!”

Loki was not fine. The stitches had moved and started bleeding again, but whatever. He just wanted his friend to be happy.

.

Despite the circumstantial evidence surrounding Malekith’s wrongdoings, there still wasn’t enough strong evidence to accuse him of committing such deeds.

“What are we going to do? Wait for him to attack again?” Thor groaned, frustrated.

“ ** _If_** he attacks again. Father’s calling a meeting tonight to warn everyone of the updates.”

“I hope father holds one too, soon… hey, Loki? How do you keep getting through Asgard’s Wall?”

“We built secret passages that only we knew about.”

“ ** _What_**!?”

“Hey, you guys never paid for it.” Loki shrugged. “You can’t bitch and moan about free stuff.”

“We won a bet.”

“ ** _Cheated_** on a bet.”

“Did you guys finish it in a year or not?”

“You guys sent whores to seduce our men on the last night!”

“Sounds like a problem of ‘self-restraint.’” Thor teased, kissing Loki behind the ear.

“Well, you’d know all about that.” Loki said as Thor’s hands found their way to their favourite place: Loki’s pants.

“Guilty as charged.”

“We could always kidnap Bonkeith and get him to confess.”

“Malekith would suspect us immediately.”

“Not if we staged a coup or something. **_Pretended_** that our respective gangs were planning on bombing the shit out of each other.”

“Oh… I like it, but there’s no way our fathers would agree.”

“Well, you’re under house arrest, so **_I_** could always just kidnap him and bring him back here.”

“I like how you think.”

.

“Angela?”

“Yeah.”

“I need a favour.”

“It’s three in the morning, Thor.” Right, which was exactly why he was calling his sister now, as he brushed his teeth, in his sweatpants and a tank top, about to join Loki (fast asleep on his bed) in slumber. They’d spend a lot of time discussing this.

“I know… Angela. Could you help us kidnap Bonkeith Smith? He’s behind this whole gang war.”

Angela went silent. “Done. I’ll get some girls on it, stat.”

“Thanks, sis.”

“Anytime, brother.” Angela couldn’t wait to sink her nails into the fuck that had almost cost Thor his head with this whole thrice damned gang war. And the one who had cost her a **_lot_** of business too because of it.

It was all about the business. Always.


	34. I can see it going down, going down

Loki pulled on his boots. The plan was simple: Loki was going to use himself as bait to draw Bonkeith in, and Angela’s friends, Taisha and Saynir, were going to kidnap the man. They were going to Svartalfheim to find him. They’d have to be discrete, they didn’t want the Dark Elves to be able to track this back to them.

He passed Jarnsaxa in the hallway. He went to move past his catatonic cousin ( ** _seriously_** , what was with that annoying fuck these days?)

“Are you going to see Thor?” Wait, hold up, what the fuck?

“What?” Loki’s face turned to ash. 

“Thor… you two’ve been,” Jarnsaxa made some half-hearted hand gestures.

“I’ve no clue what you’re talking about.”

“You two’ve been together for months, Loki. I know, it’s okay, I won’t tell anyone.” Loki doubted that, he **_highly_** doubted that. Loki’s breathing had stilled.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Jarnsaxa smiled a loopy smile. He was **_definitely_** on coke, no doubt in Loki’s mind. “It’s alright, I get it…This world wasn’t meant for people like us. Have fun.”

“Alright.” There was something haunting in Jarnsaxa’s expression, but Loki didn’t want to risk a conversation. This was dangerous shit to talk about, **_especially_** in Laufey’s house. “Er. Have fun too, I guess.”

Jarnsaxa said nothing and stared off into the distance. His cousin was seriously freaking him out. Was this some joke or something? Was this a sting operation? He shuddered, hurrying out the door.

.

Queen Aelsa of Alfheim was in her rose garden, watering it.

Suddenly, a man threw a net over her, and her legs were uprooted from the ground as she was flipped over and forced over someone’s back. Someone hit her, and then again, and again. She was carried away, her watering can discarded. She’d been kidnapped in under five minutes, and everything had already gone back to normal. Well, an eery normal.

The water from her water fountain kept spilling down, the noise of water dropping permeating the now utterly silent garden.

It would be another eight hours before anybody realised that she was missing, private as she was.

Bentley was made Provisional Head. There were vigils.

Nobody knew what had happened to Queen Aelsa.

.

“Thor! It’s for you!” His mother called from downstairs. Thor descended the stairs to see who had come over.

“ ** _Thor_**!” Amora smiled, waiting for him at the door. He gulped. Oh no. “It’s been so long.”

Frigga didn’t like Amora, Thor knew. She more or less just accepted that the girl was a part of Thor’s life. She _had_ threatened to disavow any grandchildren he might get on her.

“Amora… what brings you here?”

“Just stopped by incase you needed a **_conjugal visit_** ,” she winked.

“Uh, nope, no. I’m fine.” He could tell his mother was judging him. Geez, relax, Thor had no intentions of letting her in past the door.

“Aren’t you going to invite me in?” Was she hearing none of this?

“No.” Thor said. “Nice of you to stop by, but as I said, I’m busy. Have a good day.” He closed the door before she could get another word out. Frigga raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t worry, mother. I’m done with her. Promise this time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I sure hope 'Saxa doesn't tell...


	35. Baby In my head, I see you all over me

Loki strode into Svartalfheim, his chest still healing from the bullet that a Dark Elf had shot into him weeks ago. _Relax, relax, Thor killed him, remember? You’re fine. It’s safe. Deep breath now. Acting time._

“Bonkeith!” The name bounced off of Loki’s lips as he strode forwards towards the other man. He’d texted him to meet him on the outskirts of Svartalfheim. He’d said that he wanted to negotiate an alliance. It really was Bonkeith’s own fault for being so stupid. Why would Loki want to negotiate for an alliance right after getting shot by Bonkeith’s cousin.

Bonkeith was alone, like the sucker he was, and nodded in Loki’s direction. “Laufeyson.”

“Please, let’s not be so formal.”

“We’re here on gang business. I’m not surprised you’d want to partner with us, we’ve got plenty of men to aid on your side of the fight.”

“Exactly. There’s a secret entrance into Asgard that I’ve come to tell you of, though I didn’t want to text you incase the Aesir intercepted the message and blocked off the route. I assumed what with your cousin’s passing that you might be interested in said entryway.” Bonkeith’s eyes shone. “Do you have some paper on you? It might be hard to explain orally.”

“Uh, no.”

“The notes app on your phone?” StarkPhones let you draw in the notes app.

“Sure.” Bonkeith unlocked his phone and handed it to Loki. 

Taisha and Saynir pounced, knocking Bonkeith out and slinging him over their shoulders.

“Took you ladies long enough.” Loki said, sarcastically. Their response time had been efficient.

“Sorry. We just didn’t like the sound of his voice.” Saynir shrugged.

“Fair enough.”

.

Angela had barred them from using Heven as their storage place, and so they’d had no choice but to take Bonkeith to Asgard and store him in the most secure location in the neighbourhood: Odin’s house.

Odin was furious: more so at the fact that Loki was there. He was cold and distant towards the son of his enemy, though he did begrudgingly allow him access to their house once Thor reassured him that it was a group effort.

Thor and Loki, with shared expertise, tied Bonkeith up to a chair in Odin’s basement. When he awoke, he was groggy and disoriented. Loki threw some water at him to wake him up.

“There he is.” Loki smirked.

“Don’t toy with him. We need him alive, Loki.” Thor warned.

“Boohoo, you’re no fun.” Loki rolled his eyes. “We can extract information with him half-alive, you do realise.”

“ ** _Loki_**.”

“Fine.” Loki sighed. “So I assume that I won’t be needing this, then?” He brought out his knife. Thor grabbed it, fixing him with a glare. Then relented and gave it back. “Not as a _first_ resort.”

“Of course not. I’m not a barbarian, Thor.”

“Can you two prattling idiots please explain _what_ the **fuck** is going on!?”

“Well he’s rude.” Loki snorted.

“He _did_ say ‘please’ though. I’d give him like a 3/10 on the politeness scale.”

“Oh? So there’s a scale now?”

“There’s a scale for everything: for instance, I’d probably estimate him a 9/10 on the ‘instigation of a war’ scale.”

“Oh? And who gets a 10/10.”

“That one politician that encouraged Hitler to run for office.”

“Not whoever swiped left on that art application of his?”

“Personally think it would have all gone well if the nurse at his birth had ‘accidentally’ made a swap.”

“Fair. So she’d get a 10/10?”

“Yeah, probably… although, they did it _unknowingly_ , whereas **_this_** street rat did it intentionally.”

“Hmmm, might have to rename the scale ‘intentional instigation of a war’ then.”

“Possibly.”

“Can you both just **_shut up_**!?” Bonkeith screamed.

The pair went silent. “Might need to downgrade him to a 2/10 for that little outburst.” Thor hummed, thinking through his mentally imaged scale methodically.

“At least he moved up higher on the **_rudeness_** scale.” Loki humphed.

.

After their initial bout of psychological warfare, they left Bonkeith alone for two days before returning.

“We know that the Dark Elves started this war.” Loki said. “We know you killed Mjoll and Angrboda and Loptr.”

“What are you talking about?” The days in solitary had made Bonkeith weak. He’d been a bad actor before, but **_Norns_** , his eyes weren’t even moving right now. 

“We found DNA at the scene. We tied it back to your gang of friends.” Loki lied. It had come back negative too, though it had been a **_much_** closer match than the Aesir DNA tested, suggesting that whoever had done it was a relative of Bonkeith. They’d then tried it with Ratkeith’s DNA (obtained illegally, of course) and it was still in a lab pending analysis. “I know your cousin, Ratkeith was there. The jig is up.”

“I’ve no clue what you’re talking about. I demand a lawyer.”

“I **_am_** a lawyer, hun. And this isn’t jail, this is your worst nightmare.” Loki smirked at him.

.

It took a full two weeks of Loki’s psychological warfare tactics to break Bonkeith down enough to give them a few names. (Loki would later recount to Thor that Bonkeith had ‘squealed like a little girl’ upon Loki threatening to cut out his tongue with his knives.)

_Ratkeith, Alexei, Glybja, Wester,_ _Brutus, and Godfrey._ Internet searches yielded **_nothing_**. There was no trace of these people. And Loki would have been inclined to believe that they didn’t exist at all, except that that was how they’d felt about Ratkeith too, and that man had **_very much_** existed.

In the meantime as well though, they’d scoured through Bonkeith’s phone. There were numbers in there that had no names to them. They spoke in a code, but none of them could find the cipher for it.

Thor had managed to piece together that, with normal=code:

a=g

b=n

e=y

t=f

h=u

s=s

d=t

i=v

r=w

n=y

And also that they wrote: Jonart and Sirae in place of ‘Jotnar’ and ‘Aesir’.

That was it. That was all that they’d managed to crack. Loathe as Loki was to admit it, Thor was a better code-breaker than he was. Still, Loki had proudly been the one to identify the first possible ‘and’. Thor had ruffled his hair for it, affectionately.

.

Malekith was too busy to notice that his nephew was missing- and then too, it wasn’t like he saw him everyday anyways. Bonkeith moved about sporadically, so it wasn’t like he was going to notice anyways.

What was Malekith too busy with, you ask? Why, his new _Queen_ of course! Queen Aelsa of the Light Elves. Their wedding would make history, once more their people would be joined. It would be bliss.

He just had to convince the kicking and screaming woman that their wedding the next day was a good thing. Well, he didn’t **_have_** to, consent wasn’t necessary for a wedding in Svartalfheim, but it would be nice anyways, wouldn’t it?

.

So **_naturally_** it didn’t take Odin too long to clue in on the fact that those pining glances that Thor sometimes sent Loki meant that the two were in a relationship.

Upon receiving confirmation, he was much calmer than he would have been weeks prior when Loki’d first shown up. He supposed that it was because he’d given himself time to ponder over the fact that that person who Thor wanted to bing over was Laufey’s own son.

He did warn Thor that Thor’d need an heir though. Thor said he’d work on it. 

.

Malekith kissed his new bride. His new, tear-stained bride.

And then, to the cheers of his compatriots, he whisked her off to their marital suite and had his way with her many, many

_Many_ times.


	36. Yeah In my head, you fulfil my fantasies

“Are you sure about this?” Loki asked.

“Yes! Come on, you can put it in.” Thor panted, laying back.

“Alright.” Loki positioned his cock at Thor’s hole and pushed in. He almost came at how tight it was. It felt different to being in Sigyn- not necessarily in a way that was either good or bad, it just happened to be different. Thor was wiggling his bottom under him. It was hard to tell how he was adjusting when his face just stayed passive. 

“You can move. Don’t worry, Loki. I prepped myself with a dildo for this, I can take it.”

“If you say so.” Loki pushed forwards, enjoying the tightness around his cock. It felt good. He started to thrust, aiming fo that spot that Thor always hit when he was fucking him (despite the fact that they’d had intercourse a grand total of two times).

“Yes! Yes! Deeper!” Thor moaned, his head falling back. Spurred on by Thor’s noises, Loki obliged, taking Thor’s cock in one hand and pumping it.

Soon the awkwardness fell and it was just two men enjoying each other’s bodies. Loki plastered himself over Thor, kissing along his neck. Thor grabbed Loki’s butt and ground into his thrusts. “To the side a little.” Thor asked.

Loki did so and Thor came in his grasp, bringing Loki along with him.

Loki pulled out and tossed his condom into the bin. 

“So. How did you like that?” Thor asked, looking at Loki.

“It was nice.” Loki admitted. He preferred taking it, sure, but it wasn’t bad giving it. “I’d definitely be up for it again.”

“Glad to hear.” Thor kissed his cheek, knowing full-well that the next time they had sex he’d be taking him from behind with a hand around his throat like the little bitch he was. Woah. Where had that come from? Get it together, Thor.

.

Odin, armed with the positive DNA match to Ratkeith, strode into the meeting hall that he had demanded Malekith’s presence at. It had taken a month to get him to come along at all. Apparently he’d been married and was on honeymoon. In the middle of a war. Oh the **_nerve_**!

“Odin. What brings you here?” Malekith sneered.

“This!” He flung the DNA test at the man, knowing he had 8 more copies in his office. This wasn’t even the official version. “Ratkeith was the one who had kidnapped Angrboda and Loptr. It was Dark Elves that murdered them, not Aesir! We know all about your game: we know about your ‘special squad’ too! Ratkeith, Godfrey, Alexei, Glybja, Wester, Brutus. We know about all of it.”

Malekith growled. “You know nothing, Bor-spawn. And who is this ‘we’ you keep speaking of. For if it is you and I then I warn you that it’s about to be just ‘I’.” He pulled out his gun.

“Nay! ’Tis I.” Laufey sliced Malekith’s head clean-off with an axe. It lay on the floor, blood pooling out of it moments after it stopped rolling. The body then too collapsed. “Nice work, Odin. I should thank you and your spawn for solving this dreaded mystery.”

“Of course. And thank you for aiding Asgard in its pursuit of truth.” He hadn’t told Laufey of Loki’s involvement, had sworn up and down to both boys that he would do no such thing. There was no reason to raise Laufey’s suspicions. Not when it could cost Loki his life, hero or not.

“Pleasure. I believe that this means that the war is off?”

“Of course. And now it is time to take our spoils from Svartalfheim.”

“What is there to take?” 

Odin hummed. This was a good question. “Men, I suppose. Both of our respective gangs operate slave trades. We can always trade them around a bit.”

“Good thinking.” Laufey nodded. The two gang leaders then spent a good while discussing just exactly what they were going to do to Svartalfheim, and how they’d be auctioning off land there to the highest bidders.

.

With Malekith gone, the Light Elves were able to bring home Queen Aelsa.

They found her locked alone in a room.

Later tests on her body would find that she was a half a month pregnant. This was both a joyous and solemn occasion. She decided she’d be keeping it. She had no reason to do so, and keeping it would only ensure the continuation of a true monster’s blood, but she’d chosen to keep it anyways. Her people hoped beyond hope that it would inherit **_her_** traits and not his.

Bonkeith had to be sent to a psychiatric hospital after all the emotional distress that Loki had caused him, just to make sure that he was well and okay. He wasn’t **_actually_** insane, just traumatised.

It took a while, but the people of Nine were nothing if not resilient and adaptive. By the end of the week, everything was smoothly functioning and back to a relative-normal. No more gang deaths outside of MU, no more gang wars, just peace and the occasional burst of harmony.

.

Thor kissed up and down a writhing Loki’s spine. It was how they’d chosen to celebrate the end of the war.

He had Loki laid out on his bed, face down, Thor’s bulk pressed over him. He was fingering Loki as he kissed him, Loki’s moans muffled by the pillows his face was smushed against.

Thor reached in deep for Loki’s prostate, Loki’s cock already leaking against the covers, hard as a rock. Thor grinding his cock in the crack of Loki’s arse, spilling pre over the small of his back.

He moved the big, meaty member down. Usually they practiced safe sex, but they’d been each other’s only sexual partners for a good while presently. They’d made the decision, together, to forgo the condom. He slid in to Loki’s arse and pushed in, earning a muffled cry.

He slid into Loki like they were joined. Fused together. He was so deep he wondered if Loki could feel him up in his throat. 

Loki was loving this, Thor could tell. He was loving the feeling of Thor’s lips on his skin, biting at his neck, kissing at his shoulders, licking along his sides. He was loving the nice, big, dick sliding around in his arse, bringing him immense pleasure every time it banged up against his prostate, making his own dick ooze just a little bit more pre.

The sensation was made more intense by the fact that there was a _slight_ struggle for air what with Thor laying on top of him. Oh, Loki felt like some lowly animal, and **_Norns_** was that arousing. Thor’s hips picked up, moving faster. Soon enough, Thor spilled inside of Loki. He turned Loki over then and sucked Thor off. 

Loki leaked a little over Thor’s sheets, but Thor simply brought over a tissue and cleaned it up. “I’ll wash them tomorrow.” He shrugged. Loki nodded and fell asleep, Thor beside him. Everything was bliss.


	37. In my head, you’ll be screaming oh

Jarnsaxa started his engine, gulping, tears in his eyes. No. Tears in _her_ eyes.

It was the only way.

It was the only way.

.

The news was a bit of a shock, wasn’t it? Aunt Kella had come home and discovered Jarnsaxa dead in the family car. It had been death by carbon monoxide poisoning, and the coroner had labelled it a suicide.

Loki kicked and cursed. How had he not seen the signs!? Jarnsaxa had been all gloomy and depressed for a while now. He’d just chalked it up to his cousin being a weird crackhead.

Later in the day, Laufey, Loki, and Helblindi gathered at Jarnsaxa’s house to meet with his mother. Naturally his father and brother were not there. Loki fumed. Go figure. Even in death the pair were a bunch of arseholes.

“I just- I can’t understand how he’d do such a thing.” Kella stared blankly at a wall, tears in her eyes. “I-I don’t know-” She broke off sobbing.

Kella was a blonde woman- just like Jarnsaxa- she had crystal blue eyes and a soft-looking face which her son had inherited. It was a stark contrast to her brother, who had black hair (must’ve been recessive genes). Usually she was a sight for sore eyes… now she looked half-dead.

“Did he leave a note?” Loki asked. Helblindi and Lauefy were organising Jarnsaxa’s funeral, so it was just him and his aunt in the room. Probably for the best, Helblindi was a fantastic cheer-up-er, and this wasn’t the right moment… and as for Laufey, his emotional range, even over a matter as sensitive of this, might cost him his relationship with his sister. 

“I couldn’t find one.” She shook her head, still sobbing. Well, that didn’t sound very much like his cousin. There must be a note… “It’s probably in the car, but we’ve been warned that it’s still unsafe to go in there at the moment. They just brought out his body.” Loki nodded. “I just want to know _why?_ ” She wailed.

He knew what he needed to do. “I’m so sorry.” Loki shook his head. He needed to steal the note.

His aunt sniffed and looked at him. She smiled a bitter, sad smile. “You know… he always thought the world of you.” **_Don’t_**. Loki trained the bottom half of his face to keep it neutral. He knew from experience that if the bottom half of his face wasn’t crying, then the top half wouldn’t be either.

He hugged his aunt and they both burst into tears.

.

It was a dangerous thing going into that garage… but more dangerous would have been leaving that note to be found. ‘This world wasn’t meant for people like us’ kept playing itself in his head like a broken record. The last conversation he’d ever had with his cousin had been Jarnsaxa coming out to him, but he’d thought that his cousin was joking. Now, however, it seemed not. He needed to be the first person to read that note, because Jarnsaxa might have **_outed_** him. It was the only way to prevent another death in the family.

Loki snuck in while his father made his aunt something to eat. He’d said he needed to fetch something from home. 

It wasn’t bad, actually, going in. He didn’t feel any different. He entered the car quickly, ignoring the fact that it had served as the vehicle of death for his cousin just the previous day. They’d left both the garage door and the car doors open to air the place out and get rid of all that toxic gas.

Loki fished around, looking for it. He jumped over the driver’s seat, checked in the trunk, the side pockets, nothing. Groaning, he sat in the driver’s seat, trying not to think about the fact that just the day before Jarnsaxa had died in the same seat.

Loki was starting to feel a little bit drowsy. He sped up his efforts, wanting to get back inside and take a nap.

_Aha!_ He fumbled between the seat and the clutch. It must have fallen as Jarnsaxa- no. Don’t think about that. _Don’t. Don’t._ ** _Don’t_**.

He picked up the envelope, got out of the vehicle, and walked over to the door, groggy and blinking his sleepy eyes over and over again. He nearly collapsed by the time he’d gotten out. It was a warm day, no wonder he was so tired.

He then tucked the letter into his pants pocket and rejoined his family as they grieved.

.

“You look upset. What happened?” Thor asked, as Loki stepped in through his window. 

“Jarnsaxa died.”

“Your cousin?” Loki nodded, sadly. Thor grabbed Loki and helped him the final way in, pulling him onto his bed. “I’m so sorry. How did it happen.”

“Suicide.” Thor’s eyes widened. It hadn’t been what he’d been expecting. “He just-he killed himself. He sat in his mother’s car and kept the garage door closed, and he revved up the engine and now he’s gone.”

Thor went quiet. “Any chance it could have been an accident? Maybe he didn’t know.”

Loki shook his head. “He left a note, Thor.”

“Oh… Loki, I’m so sorry. Do you know why he did it?” Loki pulled the note out. “Is that the note?”

“Yeah. I stole it.”

“ _What_?”

“Our last conversation… I think he came out to me or something. Anyways, he’d pieced out that you and I were together… I can’t have him outing me.”

“Loki, what about his parents? Shouldn’t they get to hear their son’s last words?” This was getting crazy. Thor understood that Loki’s life was on the line, but somebody had already died.

“Not if it means that _two_ people die! Thor how are you not getting this?” Thor got it, he understood it, but it didn’t make it any less heartless to Thor to rob parents of their children’s last words! A horrible feeling was beginning to form in Thor’s stomach. 

“Well, if you’re going to open it, then don’t do it here. I will not have you insult the dead in my house.”

“Fine! Who needs you anyways?” Loki thought he’d hid his hurt quite well as he climbed out of Thor’s window. Thor felt a pang in his chest. This wasn’t good.

.

_Dear Mom,_

_If you’re reading this, then I’m dead. Don’t cry though, it’s okay. I promise you that I’m in a better place._

_I’m sure that you can recall that I’ve always been a bit_ ~~_different_ _abnormal_~~ _different. A bit more effeminate than other men… well, I guess that for a while I’ve always had this demon inside of me. Well, it’s not really a demon, I guess, more of an urge. I’ve always felt uncomfortable in my skin, I guess is what I’m trying to get at._

_Sorry for all the rambling._

_I’ve always felt like more of a_ ~~_girl_ _woman_ _female_~~ _girl. Sometimes while you’re gone I dress up in your dresses and make believe that I was born right… it’s disgusting, I know. I have an alter-ego called ‘Saxa’ and she likes to wear your long, paisley dresses and those leather heels of yours._

_I can’t continue to live like this. It’s not right. This world wasn’t meant for people like me, mom. It’s okay, don’t cry. I like to believe that I can be a girl in my next life. Maybe you and I will meet again some day. Whatever the case, I assure you that I’m in a better place._

_I love you. Even in death I will continue to love you. But I cannot live in a world that does not love me. It’s too hard. I hope you understand, and I hope that you can forgive me._

_-Saxa_

Loki gritted his teeth, furious, as he read through the lines. He ripped the paper up and stuffed it under his bed. He’d dispose of it properly the next day.

.

Thor went the entire week regretting every word he’d said to Loki. He remembered back when he’d wanted Loki to embrace his homosexuality, only to find out that his father (Laufey) had killed Byleistr- or, technically, had coerced Loki into killing Byleistr- because Byleistr had been a bisexual. Who was to say that there wasn’t some hidden nuance here that Thor was missing yet again?

So imagine his relief when Loki, albeit distraught, climbed through his window yet again. This time in better shape though too, the last time he’d seemed weak, like he could have fallen out of the window at any point (did Loki know he could just use the front door, or...?).

“Hey… you okay?” Thor asked, as Loki approached his bed to sit down.

“Yeah.”

“When’s the funeral?”

“Saturday.”

“You need me there?” Thor joked lightly. They both knew that that would be as good as signing Loki’s death warrant. Loki shook his head. No. “Did you read the note?” He still felt uncomfortable on that topic though… oh well, Loki probably knew best.

“Yeah.”

“And?”

Loki let out a deep sigh. “I had to destroy it.”

“ ** _What_!?”**

_“_ Jarnsaxa was, turns out, a transexual. He wanted to be a she.”

“She _was_ a she.” Thor stared, sternly.

Loki nodded. “I guess she was… I couldn’t let them have that note. Our people don’t bury fags.”

Thor was sick of flinching every fucking time that Loki used that damned word. It was 2019, how the fuck did people still use that fucking word!? “You know,” he tried to keep himself from seething too much. “In the civilised world, we call them ‘gay’ not the f* word.”

Instead of the pushback he was expecting though, Loki just laughed numbly. “Ah, I suppose you’re right… it’s a mean word.”

“It is.” Thor nodded in approval. 

“I’ll try to remember that.” Loki’s face crumpled once more, and he shook his head and started sobbing. Thor pulled him down and into his chest. “I couldn’t let them h- I couldn’t let them see it, Thor. They would have thrown his body away like they did with Byleistr.” He cried into Thor’s chest. “They just tossed his body in a van and I never saw him again!” He wailed so violently it shook the house.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s okay. Loki, it’s okay. Sssh, sshh. I get it, it’s okay. It’s okay. Sssh. I’m sure she’s looking down on us and thanking you for what you did. Hey, ssh, ssh. It’s okay. Sssh.” Thor soothed, kissing Loki’s crown, rocking him slightly, massaging his head. “It’s okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Same problem as before: I feel conflicted on how to refer to 'Saxa, because everyone thinks she's a 'he'. Also, I realise I haven't been going too much into Thor's discomfort around the f* word, but yeah he hates it and he hates whenever Loki uses it too.  
> Writing this chapter was NOT fun, unsurprisingly. I knew it was going to be in here, but it still wasn't fun to write. Quick story (YOU CAN SKIP THIS- YOU LEGIT DO NOT HAVE TO READ ANY OF THESE lmao, just putting that in so you can avoid wasting your time): I joined the internet in late 2014 (I was about 13 at the time). 2014 is also, famously, the year Leelah Alcorn died. I still remember some of the disgusting comments I read surrounding her passing, and writing this chapter reminded me of them.  
> I figured: since I modelled the Jotnar around early-internet homophobes, it might be best for Jarnsaxa's memory if that note isn't aired, hence Loki's anger and tearing of it. He's not mad 'Saxa's trans, he's just processing his emotions including his anger at 'Saxa for taking what he perceives to be the 'coward's way out' as well as Loki's anger at 'Saxa including something in her suicide note that would make her the scorn of town even in death.


	38. In my head, it’s going down, in my head, it’s going down

Amora put in her hair curlers, then applied her leave-in face mask.

How **_dare_** Thor turn her away?! After how far she’d walked to get to him! Grrr! He must be seeing someone, and once Amora found out who she was Amora’d kill the bitch!

Tomorrow Thor returned to school. Amora was a TA, she had all the time she needed to get some stalking in. She walked back into her bedroom, and laid under her pink and green duvet. Her cat, _Gilmore_ , a calico, meowed and walked up to her, settling beside her in the bed.

Mmm, good kitty.

.

Loki walked into school after the funeral. It had been heart-wrenching, naturally, but he’d had the weekend to recover. Kari and Thrym had managed to pull themselves up to come to **_something_** of Jarnsaxa’s, finally.

May she rest in peace.

Loki remembered Jarnsaxa’s wake. She’d looked asleep, almost. Her skin had been pale. Long, blonde hair neatly arranged. She’d looked a bit like a sleeping barbie doll, but wearing a suit. She’d been beautiful.

Loki kept having to force himself to remember that Jarnsaxa was a girl. It was a bit hard, since it was a new thing for him to have to process… but he thought to himself that Jarnsaxa would probably prefer it if she was remembered in that way.

Loki had thought, time and time again, whether or not to include Jarnsaxa’s gender in the fake note that she’d left her mother. He decided to leave it out.

And then he cello-taped the note back together and wound up popping it into Aunt Kella’s letterbox. Let her know. The only way to dishonour Jarnsaxa now would involve digging her body up, and that was a big no-no in any culture. Suck on that, Laufey.

.

“Hey… are you alright?” Loki looked at the Baldr who had asked the question.

“Um, yeah. Why?” 

“You seemed kind of down. Thor told me about Jarnsaxa.”

“She preferred ‘Saxa’.”

Baldr nodded. “Thor sends his wishes to you. He wishes he could be with you, but understands that with all the attention you’ve been getting lately, and the impenetrable wall your friends have seemed to build around you, it’s a bit difficult to do so without attracting unwanted attention.”

His friend group had been cut yet again. It was now just him and ‘Boda and Drrf, though Drrf was still in high school. Svadilfari had been livid when he’d broken up with Sigyn, and after consoling her for a bit he had taken her himself.

It also didn’t help that Loki had had to explain away the bite marks that Thor sometimes left on him as part of a ‘dalliance’ with an imaginary prostitute girlfriend of his. At first Laufey had been less than impressed, until Loki had emphasised that he was just finding himself and using her. Yeah, being an absolute piece of garbage was better in Jotunheim than being a simp for a prostitute, and wasn’t that just _telling_?

“Well, how are you? Thor tells me you have a girlfriend.”

“ _Had_ … my father found out and absolutely forbade it.”

Loki went quiet for a moment. “Well, why did you listen?”

“The only other alternative was to keep it a secret forever, which would have made us both miserable.”

“Thor and I have been a secret since we started. It hasn’t stopped us. I doubt your father approves of our relationship either?”

“Of course he doesn’t… but he’s hoping that Thor will grow out of it. And even then, he’s used to Thor disappointing him-”

“And you’re used to being the perfect son.” Loki smiled bitterly. “Let me tell you something, Baldr, little-brother-to-little-brother: I know what it’s like to have an older sibling. They’re there to guide you, they’re your introduction to _everything_ , they protect you, they care about your feelings, they shelter you from the world… but that’s the problem, isn’t it, they shelter you from the world? You never **_have_** to go and try do something new, because big bro always did it first and he loves you and he’ll guide you through it even if he _pretends_ to be annoyed.” he didn’t cry. He was thinking about Byleistr- RIP- but he didn’t cry. These were all good memories, they were not to be tarnished by tears. “Heck, sometimes he even **_might_** be annoyed… but there comes a time in every little sibling’s life where they have to stand on their own Norns damned two feet and take charge in their own lives. Thor can’t help you in this. He doesn’t have the same relationship with your parents that you have… but if you well and truly love this woman, and you want to be with her… then you’re going to have to create your own branch, the ‘Baldr Branch’ and just hope that everything works out smoothly… your parents seem very loving and supportive. I’m sure that if you stuck with Karnilla and gave it time, their tree might bend over to the ‘Baldr Branch’ just a bit.”

Baldr nodded, listening to every single one of Loki’s words. He guessed, in a way, he’d never truly have to craft his own identity: Thor was always there to do it for him. “Thanks, Loki.”

“You’re welcome.” 

.

Angrboda watched as Loki and Thor chatted. Watched the little sparkle in Loki’s eyes, the way that Thor’s hand lingered just a bit too long over Loki’s shoulder.

He knew. It sucked, it hurt, but he knew. He wouldn’t tell anyone… he’d always thought that Jotunheim’s homophobia was a disgusting, **_disgusting_** thing- heck he never even said the f* word, only ever quoted it when somebody else got called it, like that night when Loki had said it at the club, the first night that they’d met Douchebag Odinson…

Oh well. It’s not like he could be with Loki anyways. Not in this world. He'd get booted hard from Jotunheim, and unfortunately Angrboda had realised a while ago that gang life was probably the only sort of lifestyle someone as fucked up as him could ever hope to lead. It was dangerous what Loki had with Thor though too. He hoped his best-friend knew what he was doing. The last thing he needed was for another one of his friends to pass away suddenly.

He clenched his fists as he remembered Byleistr’s death. He couldn’t let that happen to Loki. **_Ever_**. He’d die before he did. He remembered the little kid with the gap-toothed grin and the penchant for causing mischief, he remembered defending him from bullies, remembered the warmth of Loki hugging Angrboda when his mom left. Loki was precious to him, more precious than Angrboda’s own life, by a long shot.

.

Given that it had been three days and no news of Jarnsaxa’s transgenderism had come out, Loki was going to hazard a guess and say that she wasn’t going to be telling anyone any time soon. Loki breathed a sigh of relief. He didn’t have to worry about anyone vandalising Jarnsaxa’s tombstone. He’d gone, at one point, and painted the flowers on it. He’d done them up in the same colours as the trans flag: pink, white and blue. Nobody would ever know, but it was the only way that he could think of to pay homage to his late cousin. 

RIP, RIP.

.

Svadilfari was back on the rugby team- and thank the Norns for it too! They’d lost a game the previous month, when neither of their star players had been able to compete.

In a way, Loki figured, this settled the war once and for all in a better way than any pact made by Odin and Laufey ever could.

And it was high time too, because they had a match next week and without Svad they were sure to get wrecked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 🎵If nothing is true, what more can I do? I am still painting flowers for you 🎶 Painting Flowers by All Time Low PROBABLY inspired the 'Loki paints 'Saxa's grave' scene, I say 'probably' because I've been singing that song since the beginning of February, and while it wasn't intentional it still happened.
> 
> Also, I hope I didn't make a mistake, because 'Boda's only supposed supposed to say the f* word once, and that's at the beginning to quote Loki.


	39. In my head, I see you all over me

SO HERE’S HOW IT HAPPENED:

Byleistr had kissed a man. He was bisexual, most of his lovers were women, but he had kissed a man. Passionately. At a night club in the bathroom. He’d had no reason to suspect that anybody would have seen him.

But apparently somebody had. On his way home he was intercepted. A message had been passed on to Laufey, Laufey had ordered the immediate arrest of his middle son. There had been photographic evidence, no denying that. Byleistr had confessed to his father, fool that he was, that yes he did have feelings for both sexes. He must have falsely assumed that his father would show him any allegiance over the fact that he was both young and _his son_.

Laufey had ordered an example be made out of him. He had his arms tied behind him for days as men came in to beat him bloody. His skin over his face had torn. Well, the skin over what would have to assume to be his face. It was a bit hard to tell what it was anymore. His eyes had both swollen shut. 

He’d been raped, there was that. Not by men, but by objects. By the end of it all, he’d been wishing for death.

They’d then gagged and blindfolded him (as though he could see in any case) and taken him some place that he did not recognise. What were they going to do to him then? Throw him in a meat grinder? It matched the tempo of the punishments he’d been receiving.

A circle had been formed around Byleistr. The circle had consisted of Jotunn males, one from each prominent house.

In the meantime, Loki had been instructed that his father had a special task for him. An early initiation to bring him into the group. Loki had become increasingly disinterested in his father’s activities. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to be in the gang anymore. He’d thought about asking Mimir if he could live with him in Midgard. Seemed like the ideal lifestyle: i.e. no gang-life. There were other reasons he didn’t want to be there anymore… he was starting to realise that he had some feelings that didn’t quite align with Jotunheim’s values, and he didn’t quite want to be around in the event that they ever got leaked. Still, he obliged Laufey’s request, not wanting to anger the other man. Everyone and their mother knew better than to anger Laufey.

Imagine his surprise when he was led to the centre of the room, into a circle of men, to find, much to his horror, his brother Byleistr. At least, he had _assumed_ it was Byleistr. Aside from it being his brother’s build, he was bloody and barely recognisable.

Laufey had approached him from behind, delivered a rousing speech about homosexuality, and placed his hand on Loki’s back. “Byleistr is no longer your brother. He was caught with a man, he’s a fag. Go on Loki, shoot him.”

“He’s your son.” Loki tried, pathetically.

“Shoot. Him.” Laufey all but growled.

“P-Please.” And in that moment Loki could tell that his brother was asking for Loki to put an end to his misery. With a heavy heart, he pulled a trigger (three times) and murdered his first victim to the cheers of all the men in the room. But when he locked eyes with one of them, Angrboda, his oldest friend, he could tell his friend’s cheers were fake. Angrboda looked well and truly sorry for Loki. Loki had to wonder why.

He had to wonder why _any_ of it had happened that way. Why hadn’t Laufey killed Byleistr himself? It would occur to Loki, later on, that Laufey must have known about Loki’s feelings towards his own sex. He must have deduced that Loki himself was a faggot. It had been a test, a trial. Had Loki failed it, Helblindi would have been an only child.

He still thought about that execution. More so now than before Jarnsaxa’s death. It had been cruel- not just the murder, but forcing Loki to administer it. No matter how often he tried to convince himself that it was merely a coup de grâce, that Byleistr would have surely died in slow agony anyways, he had to admit that at the end of the day it was **_he_** who had pulled the trigger, and that it had been the coward’s way out.

He sometimes fantasised about what would have happened had he shot Laufey instead. It would have been likely that his father had died, the other Jotnar would have then shot and killed Loki and Byleistr, though Loki’d do his part to take down as many Jotnar as he could. Helblindi would have become Gang Leader. Motivated by the deaths of his brothers, he likely would have tried to usher in a slightly more LGBTQ+ friendly atmosphere. 

Farbauti would likely have still gotten institutionalised due to her grief over Byleistr’s death (though Laufey had been to eager to send her away, Helblindi might have at least tried to be supportive and help her through her grief). And if she hadn’t been, then she may have been for her grief over Laufey’s death. Loki highly doubted she’d grieve _him_ , she’d always hated her youngest. The family dynamics in Laufey’s household had always been: Farbauti loves Helblindi, Laufey loves Byleistr, Helblindi and Byleistr love Loki and vice versa.

Still. At least he wouldn’t have been the hand that had killed his brother. Though that scenario was a bit selfish, wasn’t it? There was no winning, whichever version of events had played out, Loki was either a coward or he was selfish. His father had doomed him to hell that day that he’d placed a gun in his hand.

So maybe that was it, huh? Maybe Laufey hadn’t been trying to send a message to Loki. Maybe he’d been trying to make sure that whatever happened to his soul in the afterlife, it wasn’t going up.

Whatever. What was done was done. And Loki now had to endure life under the title of Brother Killer.

He _should_ have just left. Mimir, Farbauti and Thrym’s brother, had left. He claimed it was because he had had enough of gang life and just wanted a nice, cushy, peaceful teaching job. But there were rumours in circulation that the _real_ reason was because he was a fag. Loki’d heard his own mother calling him one in front of Thrym. Had Loki run away, his uncle likely would have helped him.

Were he to run away now though? After taking the oath, getting the tattoo, accepting his jacket? He’d be a dead man.

_Better a dead man than a trapped one_ , he thought to himself silently. 

He was meeting Thor at the school parking lot. It was late night, dark. Nobody was around- nobody _would be around_ , and even if someone came around it wasn’t like they were here to do anything really. Thor’d forgotten his phone at Loki’s (imagine Loki’s surprise when _Thor_ had pulled a Loki and snuck into his bedroom undetected!) So Loki’d come to give it back to him.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show up!” Loki smirked, twirling Thor’s phone around, as Thor entered the parking lot on that **_loud_** motorbike of his. Did motorbike’s have mufflers? Loki had no idea, but between Thor and Angrboda, Loki really wished they did.

“And miss a date with you? Never!” Thor winked cheekily.

“Har, har! This is not a date, Odin-spawn. You need to be more careful with this phone of yours.” Loki passed it to him. “Someone with bad intentions might steal it and change the names of all your contacts or something.”

“ ** _Loki!_** ”

“I’m not saying **_I_** did it!” Loki rolled his eyes, knowing full-well what he’d done. He’d also bookmarked TellyTubby porn for Thor, so suck on that!

“You’re a menace.”

“And you’re a klutz.” Loki turned to leave.

“Don’t I at least get a goodbye kiss before we go?”

“What for?”

“Coming all the way here in the dead of night?”

“I came here for **_you_** , to help **_you_** , if anyone deserves a goodbye kiss it’s me.” Loki snorted, incredulously. 

“I’m glad we’re on the same page.” Thor leant forwards and kissed Loki. Then there was a bit more kissing. Then Thor reached down and Loki swatted his hands away. 

“Not in **_public_**!”

“Who’s gonna see!?”

“That’s not the point, Thor!” A few minutes later, they left the parking lot.

And really, who _was_ gonna see? Certainly not a vindictive blonde lady with a penchant for making other people’s lives miserable, and an addiction for one Mr. Thor Odinson.


	40. In my head, you fulfil my fantasies

MU was playing The Comets.

Loki went to watch in private, dressed in a cap and sunglasses. He couldn’t bring Angrboda because their group was having a rough patch. Svadilfari was still mad that Loki had broken up with Sigyn. Not that Loki cared. He’d only ever masturbated to Svad once. There, he said it. And it was a weird one too!

Logi, Sigyn, and Skadi were there for Svadilfari. Sigyn was wearing Svadilfari’s sports jacket. Everyone on any sports team at MU had a sports jacket- _Loki_ had one, Sigyn used to wear Loki’s one… it was weird for him to even care about someone he’d never been romantically interested in. But, he supposed, that was just how it was with some people: you always felt a need to impress them, regardless of how irrational it might be.

Thor was leading the charge. He got the ball onto the ground. 5 more points for MU. Like they weren’t leading by enough already. 60-3. They’d basically won, even with- Loki groaned- 47 minutes left? Just kill him already!

It wasn’t all bad, he supposed, watching his (boyfriend? bedmate? Was bedmate accurate though? They’d had full-on intercourse and went on what one might count as dates… grrr, this whole thing was so confusing!  And yet he wouldn’t have it any other way ) subject of interest playing. Thor was excellent at the sport, and it was kind of a turn on to watch him tackle a man. So rough and aggressive. Loki didn’t even care about how much this turned him on. He was already sleeping with the bastard, who cared if he got a hard on watching him sweat a little?

Loki watched them at halftime, watched Thor strategising and ordering people around. Were he a girl, the phrase 'my panties are wet' might have applied to Loki right then and there. He started having inappropriate thoughts of Thor bossing _him_ around. Huh. Who would've guessed Loki was into BDSM? Oh well, you learned new things about yourself everyday, he supposed.

So, **_predictably_** , the Aesir won: 198-3. Poor Comets. Loki hung around, out of sight, and when he knew that Thor would be in alone, he entered the changing rooms. 

“Good game.” Loki slid into Thor's area fluidly, like a cat. Thor thought Loki would have made a fantastic ballerina. Loki had slugged him in the face the one time he'd vocalised that. They'd had passionate sex shortly after.

“Loki.” Thor smiled, tiredly, his muscles sore and aching from all the falling and the being knocked into. “I didn’t know you were coming.”

“Of course I came. I _love_ watching you get tackled so hard your pants come off a bit.” Thor blushed furiously. He thought he'd been discrete. Norns, he hoped that nobody had taken a photo or something.

“You could see that.”

“Oh honey, **_everyone_** saw that! I heard a girl behind me make a comment about how your father must be a baker-”

“Because I have nice buns.” Thor laughed, still blushing. “And what’d you say to her?”

“Nothing. Actions speak louder than words.” Loki grabbed Thor’s head and brought him in for a kiss. Thor grabbed Loki and kissed back. “Fuck yes. Take me on the floor like I’m one of your rival teammates you just pinned to the ground.”

“ ** _Loki_**!” Thor scolded. Oh, that was both hot and **_wrong_** at the same time! The last thing he wanted was a boner the next time he played a match.

Loki wrapped his legs around Thor’s waist and they fell into the lockers. Not that it stopped them. For Loki there was something sexy about a bit of pain. He blamed it on his upbringing. In no time at all, the clothes Thor had worked so hard to put back on just moments prior were off once more. Loki was licking at Thor’s tattoo, running his tongue along the nipple. Thor was fingering Loki open for the taking. 

He spat on his dick a bit and then pushed in, since they’d stopped using condoms the last time they’d had sex. Thor fucked into Loki, the high of the game chasing him closer and closer to orgasm.

He came with a shout of ‘Loki!’ about a moment after Loki had already cum with that cute look on his face. Thor wished he had a camera to take a photo of that look and immortalise it forever.

Too bad someone had beaten him to the punch.


	41. In my head, you’ll be screaming oh

Laufey watched the video that the Aesir girl had handed to him again. And again.

And again.

His blood boiled.

Loki was dead. Oh he was **_so_** dead. And so was that damned mother of his! **_One_** fag in the family had been disgraceful enough- now **_two_**!? Laufey fumed.

He’d always had his suspicions that Loki had Nancy-boy tendencies. It’s why he’d made him kill Byleistr, to teach the boy a damned lesson about what happened to fags. The only good argr was a _dead one._

Oh well. It’s not like Loki was worth all that much anyways.

“Heidrek… send word that Loki is to be captured and brought back to Jotunheim _immediately_.”

“Aye, sir.”

.

Helblindi had sent his brother a text message warning him not to come home. Norns, he hoped Loki’d seen it.

_You’re a fag. Everyone knows. We’re through_. It had read. Loki’d know that ‘everyone’ included Laufey and would stay well clear, and if Laufey couldn’t find Loki and suspected Helblindi of aiding him, then he’d have no proof. It’s not like he _explicitly_ told his brother to go and hide.

Helblindi cursed. He had **_warned_** Loki that there were rumours: and now Laufey had a full video of the Odin-spawn fucking Loki into the lockers at the MU changing rooms. This was such a bloody mess!

.

Loki did **_not_** get the text. He was walking back to Jotunheim after school- they had an assignment due the next week- when someone swung a bat into his head, knocking him out.

“Get the fag in the van!” A voice growled, picking up Loki’s still body so that Laufey could decide what to do with the latest earg scum that had tainted their streets. Good that this was being done before Loki had kids, nobody wanted him passing on his gay genes down.

.

Laufey’d decided that Loki’s fate was to be similar to Byleistr’s… but that they’d be stoning him to death. A good lesson for everyone else. It was important to educate the youth on LGBTQ+ issues… and besides, it would be fun.

.

Angrboda was walking in the hallways alone. Loki hadn’t come to school that day, odd. Usually Loki would text him or something if there was a reason that he wasn’t going to school. For some reason it felt like something was off, like something in the universe had gone terribly wrong. He shrugged the feeling off. That was a common Monday morning sentiment, it probably meant nothing, really.

He saw the other four, all of whom he hadn’t talked to in weeks, all sniggering. _Disgusting_ , he thought. In the past few weeks he'd realised that their old friend group had mainly consisted of trash. He couldn't believe he'd ever called Logi a friend, let alone Svad. Imagine lusting over your close-friend's girl (friend breaks up with the girl after a _near-death experience_ , you get mad at your friend for breaking up with the girl) and then using the girl's emotional vulnerability as an excuse to get with her. Angrboda could _never_. Drrf and Loki had been the only decent people in that group, period.

“Serves him right.” Logi sneered to Skadi. Angrboda remembered when _he_ gossiped with Skadi. Oh well, she was a cheater so who cared anyways?

“Always knew he was a fag.” She replied.

“I guess now we know why he broke up with Sigyn.” Svadilfari joked. 

Wait. A. Second. **_WHAT!?_**

“I heard Laufey wants to stone him to death.” Logi smirked. Angrboda wanted to punch the living daylights out of his former friend. He turned heel and walked away.

What was he going to do? He had nobody to help him! There was only one person he could go to.

_Thor._

.

Thor was not expecting _that_ friend of Loki’s to ask him for a private conversation, but he did.

“What do you want?” It had been a while since Thor’s last fight with the other male. Truth be told, he wouldn’t necessarily mind another.

“I know about you and Loki.” Angrboda blurted. Thor’s eyes widened. He grabbed the slightly smaller male by the collar of his shirt and brought him up a bit.

“I swear if you tell another living-”

“Thor, I do **_not_** have time for this! I overheard some others talking: Laufey’s found out, that’s why Loki’s not at school today. He’s going to stone Loki to death! We have to save him!”

Thor’s heart stopped. “Where is he?” Byleistr's life story flashed in his mind. This was **_not_** good.

“I don’t know. But Kella- Loki’s aunt- might.”

“Well then what are we waiting for? Let’s go.”

.

“Father. If you kill Loki that will be two sons whom you have lost. Is it not better to let him go like Mimir went?” Helblindi pleaded. He did not want to think about what his father’s goons were doing to his little brother. With Byleistr… he’d heard rumours that he’d gotten raped. Loki was too young for this kind of trauma- **_not that it was right for anyone to be under it_.**

“I’ve made my decision, and you need to make yours. Word to the wise, don’t waste your breath defending a fag, they’re all the same. I would hate to have to start over with a whole new family at my age.” Laufey’s tone was a warning.

Oh, what was he going to _do_!? He couldn’t lose another brother. He couldn’t lose _another brother_. Norns, and how sick was it to think that the same man who’d killed his younger brother was going to be the one responsible for his young _est_ brother’s death! It all felt like such a cruel joke!

.

Kella opened the door, her eyes flashing in recognition at the three faces on her doorstep: Odin’s son; Saxa’s friend, Angrboda; and Drrf, who was also Saxa’s friend. She knew what they were here for. Earlier she might not have helped… but after Saxa’s death? Enough was enough. She was doing this for her so- daughter. Her daughter.

“He’s in the Pit. Hurry. You know what they’d done to Byleistr by now.” Her eyes met Angrboda’s. Oh hell yes he knew. 

“Thank you, Kella.” They rushed out. The Pit was an hour’s walk, or ten minutes on a motorbike. She held her heart over her chest. How much family had she lost over these damned LGBTQ+ attitudes? Her marriage had dissolved over Thrym’s treatment of Jarnsaxa; her nephew had been murdered by his own father; her sister-in-law had been institutionalised over Byleistr’s death; ’Saxa had committed suicide; and now Laufey was trying to kill her other nephew.

_Not this time, brother. Not this time._


	42. In my head, it’s going down, in my head

Thor was the distraction. He was the only one the Jotnar would recognise as a hostile force. Drrf was there to grab the keys to Loki’s cell (he was the smallest and had the nimblest fingers). Angrboda was going to get Loki the fuck out of there because if Loki needed someone to carry him, Angrboda was more than strong enough.

Once Drrf had grabbed the keys, Thor revved his engine up to draw attention to himself. As soon as the Jotnar saw him, they called for back-up and charged. Oh yeah, they knew who he was, and they did NOT appreciate his kind LIVING, let alone on their turf. Drrf and Angrboda took out the remaining guards. Angrboda unlocked the door to Loki’s cell. He was in bad shape, but not even **_close_** to as bad as Byleistr had been, thank the Norns. Angrboda held up his finger in a ‘ssh’ motion, Loki nodded, though his eye was bruised. From what it looked like, they’d done no more than get a few punches in him. Again, **_thank the Norns._**

“Quickly, we don’t have much time.” Angrboda helped Loki up. Drrf was lookout. Angrboda didn't even stop to think of how it felt to have Loki relying on him to walk. They must have kicked at his legs or something. It was awful, and yet somehow it fuelled his ego, which was weird. He would later think back over it and decide that it was like when a mother had to look after her child with a fever: you felt awful because the child might die, but in some sick way you felt needed too.

They snuck Loki into Drrf’s parents’ car, which they’d hijacked (‘Boda didn’t have a car and also didn’t live with his father anymore (it was complicated), so that wasn’t an option) and put Loki in the trunk. If somebody stopped them, they couldn't have them finding Loki. They then drove out of Jotunheim calmly, to avoid getting pulled-over, and to Midgard to Mimir’s flat.

“What’s going on?” The grumpy old History Professor questioned. It was midday and he'd been cooking his lunch, so sue him for still being in a bathrobe, his grey shoulder-length hair hanging uncombed. He'd had the great fortune of having his students be away on a field trip and he was going to _enjoy this day_ , dammit.

“We need a place to hideout. Please.” Angrboda begged, as Drrf opened the trunk. Mimir’s eyes widened at the sight of his estranged nephew. He was limping and needed support in standing from the short, weird-looking man who was with the pair. “Laufey will kill him.” Mimir had never liked Laufey. Mimir nodded.

“Bring him in.”

.

Loki held an ice-pack to his face to quell the bruising on it. After he’d woken up they’d slapped him some and kicked him (in the nuts too), and then taken turns punching him. He guessed he ought to be grateful that they didn’t take it any further…

What he **_couldn’t_** understand, however, was how or why ‘Boda’d found and rescued him. Didn’t he know what Loki’d done?

Angrboda walked into the room just as Loki was thinking of him. Funny how things worked sometimes. “Alright, we’re going to patch you up. We’ve found you a place in Midgard to stay, but while you heal Mimir says that you can stay here.”

Loki shook his head. “Nine is not safe for me anymore. Nowhere is. I might as well just end my own life before Laufey gets the chance.”

“No!” Loki flinched at the ferocity in Angrboda’s voice. “We’ll get you out. We will, Loki, I _promise_.”

“Why are you helping me anyways? Don’t you know I’m a- I’m gay?” Loki looked up at Angrboda. Angrboda sighed, head in his hands, and took a seat opposite Loki.

“Oh, Loki… I’ve always known you were gay.” Angrboda admitted.

“Then why did you stay friends with me?”

“Because I’m bi, and homophobia is stupid.” Angrboda said, point-blank.

Loki went silent. “Did you also know…?”

“That you had a crush on me for like eight years? Yeah. I had a crush on you too for a bit… I like to think that in another life we’d have made it as lovers… but this isn’t the right one, huh?”

Loki snorted. “No, I suppose not.”

“We almost kissed that time in the gym.”

“So I wasn’t imagining it?” Loki chuckled. “That one was what led me to… well, I’m guessing you know.”

“Yeah.” Fuck. “Anyways, it all worked out for the best, I guess…” a jealous possessive streak flared in Angrboda, but he pushed it away. Loki needed him right now. “He treats you good?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. You deserve to be happy.”

“Thanks.”

.

Laufey had set up patrols all around Jotunheim looking for Loki. They were also looking for Angrboda now, and Drrf. 

Drrf wasn’t officially a member of the Jotnar, he was still a minor, so they couldn’t exactly ask for his head. He was to stay with Mimir, who’d tutor him in history. Angrboda and Loki? They were fair game. Laufey’d put a bounty on them.

“We need to leave Nine.” Angrboda had said, ignoring Loki’s protests of ‘it’ll never work’. “We can go somewhere, change our names… he doesn’t have any jurisdiction in the outside world, you know.”

“And where would we go?”

“Somewhere discrete, but somewhere where we’d also blend in fairly easily.” Angrboda volunteered.

.

It was a bright, sunny day in Nine. The birds were singing, kids were laughing, Thor’s heart was crackling into two.

“Norway, huh?” Thor said, trying not to sound too bitter, as he faced Loki on his front porch. Loki was all well and healed, save for a little bit of swelling. He no longer wore the black, leather jacket that Thor had grown accustomed to seeing him wear. Thor liked to think that he’d burned it, though it was more likely that they’d stripped him of it when they’d captured him since he was no longer a ‘Jotunn’. Instead, Loki stood dressed in a red plaid shirt and a pair of black jeans with sneakers on. He looked like a normal kid. It warmed Thor’s heart up somewhat.

“Yeah.” Loki nodded, awkwardly, twirling his foot around. Norns, goodbyes were so hard.

Thor gulped, nodding. “You can’t-you can’t _stay_?”

Loki shook his head. “In Nine, I’m a dead man walking. In Norway I’m discrete at least.”

“Are you going to go directly? Or, like, take a long route to throw him off, or-”

“Thor, Thor. Relax, Thor, I’ll be fine.”

“Well do you have enough money? I could spot you some-”

“Thor!” Loki burst. “Stop! I just came to say goodbye, everything’s already been planned out, we’re good.”

Thor’s lower lip wobbled. “Please don’t go.”

“I don’t have a choice.”

“I love you.” And there was it, there was where it was! Those three words that Thor had said earlier, the ones that had led to Loki’s shooting (at least in Thor’s mind). The words that Loki had never been able to say back.

Loki threw his arms around Thor. “I love you too!” He sobbed. “I love you so much, Thor.” The pair just held one another, crying for a solid hour. It took Angrboda coming up to call on Loki for them to stop.

“Take care of him.” Thor begged.

Angrboda nodded at his once-enemy. Only ‘once’ enemy, because now it seemed as though the pair shared a common goal: keeping Loki safe. “Always.”

The good weather was possibly the cruellest thing about that day.

.

And as Thor watched Loki’s plane take off into the sky from the safety of his window, as the heaviness of everything that had just happened finally came and sank down on him, Thor realised something: this was all his damned fault.

Not pursuing Loki, no. Pursuing Amora. Word had gotten out around school, he knew it was her who had done it.

_It’s wrong to play with someone’s emotions like that_. Hadn’t he said something to that effect once to Loki? And yet Loki had told him to go and sleep with someone to throw the press off of his trail, and he’d done so, and now look at what had happened. He literally only had himself to blame for the misery he felt.

Thor heard a knocking at his door.

“Come in,” he allowed, glumly.

It was Baldr. He had cocoa. “Hey there, Sunshine,” his neatly-dressed brother greeted.

“Hi, Baldr.”

“You look dead.”

“I feel dead.”

“Been there.” Baldr chuckled, handing Thor a drink. “So, Loki’s gone, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m gonna miss him.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah… without him I wouldn’t have Karnilla.” Baldr admitted. “I would’ve gone back to Nanna like father wanted.”

“That’s nice.”

“It seems we both like ‘bad girls’, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“You know… you can always talk to me about this, right?”

Thor took a gulp of his cocoa, a chocolate-y moustache forming over his lips. “What’s there to talk about? It feels like I just had my heart ripped out with a plunger or something.” 

“Hey.” Baldr patted a hand over Thor’s arm. “Hang in there. Once the weather clears, and Laufey’s forgotten him, you can maybe go on a ‘vacation’ somewhere, and travel by foot or something to see him.”

“Nope. Can’t. I don’t know where he is, and I don’t have his number. He’s deleted all his social media and changed his name now too.”

Baldr shook his head, smiling. “Love always finds a way, Thor.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor babies :( Oh well, it wasn't meant to last I guess. Epilogue next chapter.


	43. It's going down in my head

“What happened next, papa?” Módi asked, big blue eyes wide and staring at Loki. Módi was the world's cutest four-year-old with his big, earnest blue eyes and short-cropped blond hair, and big cheeks. He looked almost cruelly like Thor. It made Loki's heart shudder.

Loki bit his lip, sadly. “And then… and then I never saw him again.” He ruffled his son’s hair sadly. It had been 10 years since he’d left Nine. “Thor was called back to Asgard, and I couldn’t come because I’d be killed. So I stayed here, waiting, hoping, praying he’d come back…” he shook his head. Módi looked heartbroken. The wistful look in Loki’s eyes wasn’t helping. 

“Alright, enough stories. It’s bed time for you, Módi.” A voice grumbled from the doorway. Módi got up, hugged his papa, and went over to his fadir. Thor put a hand on his son’s shoulder and told him to go up to his room. “Do you **_have_** to tell him stories like that?” Thor grumbled.

“Well, I don’t **_have_** to, but you should see his little face and the way it wobbles!” Loki placed his hands on either side of his face as his eyes widened with joy. “Grr! Kids are the best! They just care so much about you-”

“You sound like a psychopath.” Thor rolled his eyes. “And quit it, he’ll figure out I’m ‘Thor’ eventually and then he’ll hate me, you, or a combination of us both.”

“Don’t worry, **_Donald_** , I think you’re good.” Loki laughed. “Did you put Thrud down?”

“Yes. She’s still running a bit of a fever.”

“Kids get sick.” Loki shrugged, getting up off of the floor where he’d been sitting cross-legged with their son. “We just need to keep her body from over-heating, and give her the meds the doctors prescribed.”

“And I was ‘ _crying like a little girl_ ’ when you left, huh?”

“Don’t you know it!” Loki didn’t peck Thor on the cheek only because he feared he might wind up carrying Thrud’s cold back to Módi.

Two months after Loki had left to Norway with Angrboda, Thor had landed up on their doorstep. Apparently he’d tracked Loki down to Oslo using cell-records and flight tickets. Loki ought to be concerned if he were that easy to trace. Who knows whom Laufey might send after him?

Thor had told him he’d quit the Aesir. It took some convincing, but they soon settled into a regular routine. They both enrolled at the University of Oslo (as did Angrboda) and continued their studies. Thor had switched medical paths and decided to become a neurosurgeon, Loki still wanted to be a lawyer.

They’d both become respected professionals in their own fields: Donald Blake and Serrure Smith. Well, Loki supposed, Serrure Blake now, technically. He and Thor had gotten married 8 years ago. They’d adopted Módi 4 years ago- his mother had left him at the hospital, which was technically a lot nicer than some mothers did- and Thrud just that year. They had undergone IVF in Ukraine, and were expecting twins. One Loki’s and one Thor’s. It didn’t mean they loved their current children any less, but, although it seemed a bit stupid, they wanted to preserve their biological legacy.

“You set Módi down, let’s not have him catching whatever she’s got.” Thor said.

“Aye.” Loki walked off to set their excitable young son down to sleep.

Thor’s family visited from time to time. Laufey was still alive, so that wasn’t going to happen on Loki’s side. Angrboda had gotten a new girlfriend, Mögþrasir, a year into their lives in Oslo. They were married and had three girls. **_She_** was not a bitch, Loki happened to like her very, very, **_very_** much. Baldr had gotten with Karnilla, and they had two kids of their own: twins. Baldr was doing a good job in leading the Aesir, having a fearsome War Queen helped, Loki supposed.

Verity had come over to Oslo to teach English, which made everything x100 better than it already was. They got together _all the time_ to talk about the kids and Verity’s new girlfriend, Angela. Apparently, this Angela knew Thor. They had yet to set up a meet-up date for the pair. Verity was thinking Angela was going to propose soon, and was working on her own proposal for the lady. 

30 years into his life and Loki was finally happy.

‘I’m straight’ his closeted-ass!

End.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The 'I’m straight' comment comes from Loki’s second line to Thor in the story.  
> Lmao, like I'd ever end a Thorki fic with them breaking up 😂Bitch please!
> 
> Also, I don't know what's more depressing: the fact that I wrote this long-ass story full of cliche's or the fact that I lowkey want a sequel where they have to return to Nine and Laufey has to confront the fact that Loki's got a family. (I guess it's partly because I'm a petty bitch, and PARTLY because it's been like 4 years since I first read Dante and Aristotle Discover the Secrets of the Universe, and I'm STILL waiting on the sequel, which I hope features Ari's brother).
> 
> Anyways, you've read enough! 😂Go and rest your eyes!


End file.
